Snow Day

We had our first official Snow Day of the year (and of my teaching career). The wind was whistling all night. Our window was shaking and when we woke up, there was a large pile of SNOW piled on the window sill, INSIDE our BEDROOM. Teachers could take the day off if we wanted to use a personal day, but some of us chose to brave the elements. Alision, Kyle, Brett and I set out at about 9:00, once there seemed to be some light in the sky. I wore my coat with the tunnel hood and goggles. The wind was crazy. At one point on our walk it was just white everywhere--we couldn't see anything around us. I was almost clausterphobic. The wind helped to edge us along, as it was at our back for most of the way. Every once in a while it would gust from our left and I had to focus to stay on my feet. I had a thought at one point that if I fell over, I wasn't quite sure how I would get up.

Once we neared the school, we could make out the forms of the building and the school lights along with the trees. We hiked up our usual path and all of a sudden we were face to face with a chest deep snow drift. I was carrying a bag and it hit the drift first--I couldn't figure out what happened. When everything is just white it's so hard to have any sort of depth perception.

This winter is much worse than anything I saw last year. I hear people talking in town that the winters used to always be like this, but it has been many, many years since there has been one with these caliber storms. One of the other teachers, Velma, that lives in the village had to be dug out of her house. The snow was drifted right across their window and door. Some boys went to their house in the morning to help them out.

The wind was the strongest here I just had to hold on! That's the light of the school that we are walking towards!