In Wisconsin, we got the tail end of Winter Storm Nemo last night, with just a few inches, and today it’s a beautifully sunny day. The outlook for the east coast however is between a foot and two feet, which is truly monstrous.
But no matter how much it snows (and living in Wisconsin these past few years, I’ve seen and shoveled my fair share), I can’t resist the snow. It is just beautiful, it always manages to enchant me. One of my favorite writers on the internet, Auston Habershaw, penned a perfect paean to snow that speaks to me as well as for me:
Snow is something enchanted. It changes the whole world, flake by flake, degree by degree, until we emerge from our hiding places and find ourselves somewhere new and clean and fresh. The drab ordinariness of our daily world is now blanketed in silence and light, glowing beneath an invisible sun. You breathe deep, and the air sears your lungs with its chilly clarity. It’s like waking up from a bad dream and letting all the heavy, sticky violence of your nightmare fall away. There ‘s just you, alone, calm and surrounded by the quiet beauty of a new world.
It is no accident to my mind that CS Lewis had Lucy stumble through the wardrobe and into a Narnia locked in eternal winter. There seems nothing else in nature that captures the mystery and enchantment of life than a wood cloaked in shimmering ice.
there’s more, read the whole thing. I shared it on Facebook too and I hope it goes viral. Snow is beautiful. Even if you live in Northrend.
Also, did you know that it’s the Weather Channel that started naming these winter storms, not the National Weather Service? Literally an invention of their marketing department, and inspired by Twitter. Go figure.