old guy

a few weeks ago i was stuffin some muffins (after all that is my job) at one of the gas stations and an old guy and I started having a conversation. Old, like, probably in his 80s at least. What he said made me laugh.

"Oh yeah now its the bitching and grumbling season. It's been snowing since God had a pacifier, and complaining about it every year is ridiculous."

Then he laughed, bought his coffee and wished me a safe winter.

I do love the snow. I love everything about it. How it's fluffy and spattery when it's wet, watching it build up after it starts to stick, and then when it's done snowing, watching it decay a little... how it gets an icy crust on it and you can walk on it without breaking through sometimes, how it settles into the crevices it's covering. I love how on a night with a fresh snowfall, you get to see the invisible things. You get to see where the deer are going to and coming from, the most trod path for the cats through the yard. And when it melts off, you can see neat patterns in the mud. Actually i think frozen mud is about the most trippy looking thing there is.

I thought it was really cool how late at night the other night, when the snow had stopped, all the sudden all these people were out playing in the snow, walking around together, looking at how the snow built itself on tree branches. I mean, it was literally after midnight, and whole families were out in it. If we let it, snow brings out the kid in all of us. If you're so serious, so grown up, that you can't grab a hunk of cardboard and shoot down a hill ONCE in the wintertime, and holler all the way to the bottom, what a crummy life you must lead. And I do know one guy who is so serious like that, and he's just a drag to be around.

I just don't like driving in it. Because I'm not good at it. I can drive great in rain, on sand, in mud... but ice and snow... not good at it.