Slip Sliding Away

As it did for much of the Northeast this week, the weather turned on our fair Capitol yesterday and delivered 12 straight hours of light snow. 12 hours of snow anywhere else would most likely result in at least...7 or so inches. Not so in DC. We only had about 2 inches, but it was lovely nonetheless.

I love snowy days, and I especially love them in the city. A normally loud and crowded area becomes peacefully quiet, where people move more slowly and everything takes on a more welcoming feel with the buildings and cars and trees and parks enveloped in this new blanket. Even though it snows every single winter in DC, at least a couple of times, no one knows how to deal with the snow any better each time it falls, city authorities being the worst. So people just stay close to home, which is nice.

I went for a walk around 8:15pm last night--the snow had slowed and the flakes that were falling were the billowy large flakes. Not many people were around, no sidewalks had been shoveled. Walking down past the row houses with the Christmas trees all lit up and the snow falling and the quiet was a lovely way to wind down a busy day holed up studying for exams.

When I left the house this morning I was reminded of why snow in DC is nice during the period of time that it is falling, and that's about it--there are no city wide mechanisms for clearing snow. In Vermont, you can go to bed with snow falling to beat the band and by morning a foot or more of snow has been plowed off most major (and not so major) roads, sidewalks, driveways etc. In DC, the snow sits there and freezes into an ice skating rink the size of...well...the city. I walked to the metro this morning, normally a brisk 8-10 minute walk--it took about 25 today. As I teetered in my snow/ice-inappropriate Pumas calculating each step while watching cars slide and skid to stops at lights and stop signs the only thing I could think was "omgomgomg please don't let me fall and break my laptop!!!! It's almost EXAMS". Having had a hard drive crash 2x now in exam periods, I am highly protective of my little machine. 4x in about 7 blocks a foot went out from under me, but using my cat-like (HA!) reflexes I saved myself each time.

I think I might deposit a shovel and bag of ice on each of my neighbor's doorsteps for the holidays with an instructional note on how easy it is to clear the paths in front of their homes...or maybe I'll just get a better pair of shoes...I'm thinking crampons..