Blog: Articles filed under winter

I always forget that November is a busy month. October lulls me into a false sense of security, for despite its containment of midterms, it never really has much work for me. Then November comes around, and suddenly it’s whoa. Where did all this homework come from? Oh, and I’m working all weekend for a fundraising event at the gallery? Great.

This weekend was probably my busiest weekend of the year in terms of inverse amount of free time available to me. I spent the week working on an essay for my Medieval and Tudor Drama class, which I love. The prof is great, and I‘m learning a lot and reading literature I probably wouldn’t otherwise read. The essay was originally due Friday, but the prof extended it to Wednesday, which is a great relief. I‘m feeling confident about it, but the extra time has helped.

So yeah, this weekend was the art gallery’s annual Christmas House Tour fundraiser. This consists of a self-guided tour of houses decorated by local businesses. Today was the tour proper, so we had to work 9-5 for that. Friday night was the dinner for the home owners, and I worked that with Brittany. On Saturday, people who paid an extra $10 could view the homes by night and come to the gallery for a special reception. That was a long night, and by the time we finished at 11 PM, I was ready to go to bed. After all, I had to get up and go to the gallery by 9 the next morning!

I was giving Brittany and Thea a ride home. It snowed for the first time yesterday, so the parking lot was full of great packing snow. While I was brushing the snow off my car, Brittany and Thea instigated an impromptu snowball fight involving them, myself, and Lesya, another coworker who was also de-snowing her vehicle.

I haven’t had a snowball fight in ages! It was great. Cars provide interesting cover, but we were close enough that my terrible aim wasn’t much of a problem. And Thea threw a snowball that hit me right in the face—which was awesome.

So as we were driving, we decided that instead of immediately going home, we would go for a walk from Thea’s house. Several stops later so that Brittany and I could obtain clothes more appropriate for outdoors, we had conceived of and discarded the idea of building a snowman in Thea’s front yard. Rather, we walked to the nearest Tim Hortons, where we got tea and hot chocolate. I’ve never been in a Tim Hortons so late at night, and it was a little eerie. The building was so brightly lit compared to outside, and it was nearly empty—but not quite.

On the way back to Thea’s house, we passed a house where one of my brother’s friends lives, and my brother was leaving it. So we said hi, and as his massive green truck drove past, we took aim at it with more snowballs. Then Brittany and Thea took aim at me, and I had my second snowball fight of the night.

That’s right: first snowfall of the year, and I’ve already had two snowball fights. If you feel envious, that’s because you are.

I’ve had a long week. There are more long weeks ahead, as the term finishes and this whole Christmas season descends upon us, though I kick and scream the entire way. But all that stress and fatigue drains out of me when I think about how much fun I had tossing some snow at people. It reminds me that I don’t spend enough time doing that sort of thing—embracing the kid in me and just having fun, not because I have the free time, but because the snow and the people are there. We were all tired, but we took a moment to put our essays and our assignments aside, to stop and enjoy the snow and the night, to pause prior to another long day of work.

And that was good.

SNOW

There is no other way to describe it. Since it started four days ago, winter has systematically and ambitiously blotted out any trace of summer from our lovely little town, plunging us into a deep snowy (literally) miasma of cold. And that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

But there is snow, and lots of it. My dad and I spent about an hour shovelling this morning—and that was just to clear the driveway so I could go to work. For those of you who live in an area that does not get snow, or not much snow, then take a look at these photos to get an idea of what our winters are like (some are more mild than others). For those of you who also deal with massive amounts of crystallized water, then I feel your pain.

Don’t get me wrong: snow is great. I love shovelling. But sometimes, the sheer volume boggles the mind. I woke up this morning, went outside to shovel, and it just … it looked insane. It was insane. This is all insane.

Welcome to Canada. Pick up a shovel and leave your sanity at the door.