Raindrop Races

How much can I write about snow?  It seems every time we get a glimpse of green and warmth it gets smothered in a parfait of ice and snow.  Just Friday I hopped over puddles and felt too hot in my winter jacket while I ran errands around Squirrel Hill.  And now, today, I wake to the sound of plows clearing a fresh cover of snow from the parking lot outside my apartment window.

Today is Sunday and, lately on Sundays I’ve started to wear my glasses rather than waste a new pair of contacts.  This takes a little getting used to each weekend since my contacts prescription is a -5.00 and my glasses a -4.50, the level my eyes were about four years ago when I bought the frames.  But I have no idea what exactly this means other than my inability to distinguish details of items more than six inches in front of my face without either as a filter.

Normally this difference in prescription is fine, I squint a little more and rely on my peripherals a little less.  I don’t drive even though my eye doctor tells me I’m able to.  And aside from the time spent in my natural place I don’t often leave the apartment.   

Today, however, as I walk the route to the garden it is snowing.  A light dust that falls in slow motion.  It clings to my hair like the stuffing of my patched-up down comforter.  It hits me out of trees as though we are locked in a one-sided snowball battle.  Buries my tall witch hazel like one of the low-lying ferns.

Mostly the snow is attracted to my glasses as though they were the windshield of my dormant SAAB (which is currently buried in 16 inches of New Jersey snow).  Whether I’m walking the path or still and observant, the clumps of snowflakes gather on my smudged lenses.  The warmth of my face creates a defroster effect that causes the clusters to melt almost immediately.  I am left looking through a warped window, the kind that looks as though it might be made of liquid.  The little bulbs on of the witch hazel seem magnified while the twigs and trunk seem far away.  If I wait long enough before cleaning my glasses on the sweater hidden beneath my jacket, my surroundings completely disappear.  I am left to see the world as I would from the back seat of my parent’s Volvo in the rain.  The passing background is gone in a misted blur.  I focus my eyes on the racing drops, betting against myself on which will reach the bottom first and internally cheering for my winner.  This race is much shorter than those down the car’s window yet no less exciting. 

This doesn’t happen when I walk through the rain in my glasses, with my head down I can usually make it through the weather without needing to clean them.  But in the snow, it doesn’t matter where I look, the swirling crystals are attracted to the lenses.  They find their way through my scarf and hair, around my bent head to where my glasses slide off my nose.

The promise of warmer weather later in the week doesn’t fool me, I know there will be more snow before spring is here to stay.  But in the mean time I’ll have to work on more ways to talk about snow.