Snow Day

All of the snow reminds me of where I am from. I try to be stoic, but the truth is sometimes I miss where I grew up. I am not even sure if I should call it home. After all, home is where the heart is and my heart is here. A little piece of it might be there. I think it would feel like betrayal to call it home after three years. Therefore, I will go with calling it the place where I come from.

The place where I come from is cold eight months out of the year. I remember snow like today. I used to get up early and leave my house at 5:30 in the morning to get to work. One day, the morning was dark and luminous at the same time because of the perfect downy snowflakes. I was inside of a snow globe. That is the perfect snow.

I saw the northern lights where I come from when I was 10 years old. I was in my gray snowsuit laying in the snowy front yard with the older kids. It was midnight; I was eating snow and watching a glowing performance of lights that I thought was just for me. Back then, I did not realize that would be the only time in my childhood I would see such a thing. I can recall the taste of the sopping snow and feeling minute.

There were neighbor girls where I come from. We sledded and ice-skated every day after school. We built snowmen, forts, and had snowball fights. When we were finished playing we would put our dripping knit mittens on the radiator vents to dry and make hot cocoa with milk.

I remember 1991 where I come from. My brother was born a month before the blizzard. I was a princess on Halloween and it snowed. Is snowed and snowed and snowed. Dad let us jump off the roof that year into the humongous snow banks.

Christmas where I come from involve ice fishing. My uncle's coveralls always smelled like outside when I hugged him and my aunt's flannel shirt scratched against my cheek when it was time to say goodbye. My first fish was a Northern.

I miss it all today, including the snow. I miss where I come from.