eating white snow

Taken today during a snowy walk around the neighborhood in Wilmington, VT.

I just got back from a walk around the neighborhood.  This, after four straight days of not leaving my house.

Don't worry I'm not a hermit (or I am).  I haven't left for a combination of reasons.  The first being that between my trip to Long Island a few weeks back, Christmas, and then our trip to Buffalo, it kind of felt like we hadn't been home for three weeks.  Plus, I've been working on my screenplay (the one I promised myself I'd have done by the time 2011 was) 8-10 hours a day.  Plus, it's been snowing.  And freezing!  Every day!  She says this as though surprised, forgetting she moved ten miles from a place called Mount Snow.

Today it's warm (okay, it's what the weather man calls "mild") or, at least, it isn't Ice Cold.  Around 3pm, I think I finished a draft of my script (we'll see when I start reading the PDF and feel the need to change every fifth word) and by then, I really felt like I needed to get out of the house.

It is still winter, after all, so in anticipation of leaving I put on a sweatshirt, a Patagonia coat, and my new thermal boots.  I put Murgy in her harness and leash and we were out to meet the world.

I hadn't walked around the "neighborhood" in about a month.  By the way it's not a neighborhood, it's a bunch of houses situated on a mountain, made to look like a neighborhood.  It's a challenge.  I clocked it -- at a normal pace, the first sixteen minutes are either downhill (at points steeply so) or flat.  That's pleasant, and you think "Why don't I do this more often?" Then, it happens.  You start going uphill.  And not just "up a hill" - UP hill.  Up a mountain.  Serious incline.  Three minutes into the (at a "please don't let me fall over" pace) twenty-minute ascent, conversation is no longer possible.  I went from urging Murgy to discontinue stopping to sniff the ground every two seconds by saying, "Come on, Murgs." to doing it by just yanking her (Talking. Not. Possible.) to eventually just letting her stop every two seconds to sniff because it meant I got to stop every two seconds.

I was sure to feign annoyance in case anyone was watching so they'd think I was totally into the uphill walk, I just had to stop because my dog stopped.

There's three and a half of these mountain hills you have to get up to get to my house.  The first one is fine, the second one is death, and the third one is like, "Are you? Come on. No." Turning the bend from second to third, I was overcome with thirst.  Why did I wear so many layers on a fifty degree day?  And do tell why I would wear thermal boots?

And then...

I stopped and ate snow.

It was white, clean snow.  It was at least five feet off of the path.  I only ate two bites of it.  It was the most refreshing, wonderful, pure cold beverage I have ever had.  I had forgotten what snow tastes like.  Crisp, fresh.  Suddenly I was eight again and didn't have any pretenses about things like eating snow.  Oh man, it was wonderful.

Luckily no one was around to see the scene:  A twenty-six year old weirdo in way too many layers for a sunny (albeit snowy) day, savoring the lovely coldness of snow, while her dog just stares at her like "Um, really? I didn't even eat that stuff."

Snow consumed, I powered on.  By the end of the walk, the feeling of death wore off and was replaced by that good feeling that comes after exercising.  Whenever we don't have a frostbitten blizzard day, I'll try to keep going.

But maybe I should buy a water bottle?



.lsm