Last Snow?

Just look at that brilliant sky! How can you be unhappy with a sky this beautiful above you?
Last week we had a big snow. Not like the feet of snow that we had when I was growing up, but snow enough to cover the surroundings like so much rich yummy frosting. Is this the last snow of the season in Ohio until the end of 2008 when the snow will return?
I love snow.
There. I've said it. My family and friends are sick to death of hearing me say it. Everyone around my town seems to hate snow. I love it. Could live with it 12 months out of the year.
I am in the extreme minority, it seems, with this seemed craziness.

If I could have all my favorite flowers in a humongous greenhouse so as not to go without that love, all would be perfect beyond my dreams. It would have to be a greenhouse with lots of planting beds so I could dig in the dirt. I love digging in the dirt. I love the smell of the dirt. I love getting dirt under my nails (I clean it out as soon as the digging is all finished, let me assure you). I would have my snow, glorious snow and my greenhouse- surrounded by snow.

I love the anticipation of a snow storm. The not knowing how much God has decided to let fall upon the Earth. The weathermen all think they know. They don't.

These are photos I took around my neighborhood last week. A spring snow. I love Springtime snow. It is always heavy and wet. I know. I'm crazy. I've been told that --at least once, or a hundred times. I like to stand outside after a snow storm and just listen the quiet.

Maybe I need to try to explain away my craziness.

It's not that I don't enjoy April showers and jumping into puddles wearing my "puddle ducks" and laughing at the raindrops, sheltered under my umbrella.

I do enjoy sitting with family and friends on a warm July 4th evening watching the fireworks explode over our heads in the summer sky.

I especially enjoy the crisp colored leaves crunching under my feet as I embrace an almost painted-like October Ohio day.

It's just that I do not fare well with the HOT, sticky, humid, Ohio, long, drawn out months. There are actually only 3 horrible weather months (in my own opinion). Everyone else would say,"Yes, the months it snows."

Nope. Not my response. I feel... well- just yucky when it is above 95 for days on end and high humidity. I actually spend more time in the house in the summer (air conditioning turned to "Arctic") than I do in the winter.

No cabin fever here!!!

My Dad is the opposite. He says it is not hot enough unless he can work outside with his shirt off. And he loves it when it is 90 or above.

He is 81 years young and still VERY active. He thinks he is still 50 and I'm glad of that. I want to be like that when I am 81.

He lives each winter in Florida along with just about half the population of the senior citizens of Ohio, it seems. He has a house on the ocean water on the gulf side. Summertime he lives here in Ohio. He is threatening to stay much longer in Florida this year because of the snow not wanting to just go away. My snow!!

And don't even get me started on the mosquitoes in Ohio!!

My whole life I have always swelled up like a balloon from those hideous bites. I have to take cover in the house when everyone else is outside enjoying the cooler summer night air, cuz that's when the mosquitoes come out to feast on Amy. 

And poison ivy/poison oak too! If it is blowing in the wind- somehow, I will get it. I get it with a secondary infection and a trip to the doctor and sometimes even the emergency room. So summer means I end up- sweaty clothes, itchy skin and cloistered-- safely inside the air conditioning. But snow. SNOW. Safe... cool, non-itchy.

I always say, "you can always put more clothes on if you are cold~~but if you are naked and still hot...THEN WHAT?

Oh. By the way...

Unless you didn't think I was crazy enough.

I rarely wear a coat unless it is colder than 20 degrees outside.

Come visit me any time at the loony bin. My name is permanently carved into the door.