A Little Taste of “Home”

To most people in other parts of the country, our little 5 or 6 inches of snow probably seems laughable. After all, when I watch the news, I’m starting to get the idea that anything less than a foot hardly seems worth mentioning. But you have to realize that here in Texas, this is quite a big deal.


The snow itself wasn’t totally unexpected: each year we seem to get our one dusting of snow for the year either on, or around, Valentine’s Day. So today’s snow wasn’t the big surprise. The big surprise had already come on Christmas Eve – our first white Christmas in this area for over 80 years. Today’s surprise was related to the amount of snow that we had. The 5:00 news report was saying that if we got just ½ inch more, today would be the snowiest day on record for our area, and we have already had the fifth snowiest winter ever recorded. Wow! (For the record, I say, “So much for global warming.” If the polar ice caps are still melting after this, we can just relocate all of the polar bears to the lower 48 states, and they’ll feel right at home!)

Toffee went out in the snow a little bit, but he was content to watch mostly from the porch:


Cookie, on the other hand, was all over the yard, sniffing and hunting:


I trudged out and put out some bird seed. Word soon spread, and the birds waited in the trees for those stinking dogs to go back inside:


Cookie decided to make them wait, and she parked her fanny right next to the bird seed:


What was Chewka Marie’s reaction to the snow? She had totally disappeared under her “linens”:


After lifting the corner, I could see just a little sliver of tail:


Then, a little face popped up:


Then, a truly annoyed little squirrel told her mother to leave her alone and let her sleep!


I have to say, I love this winter, and not just because the snow is pretty; it’s more than that for me. It truly is one of those small blessings that can lift my spirits. You see, we went to Wyoming a couple of years ago on a trip, and I fell in love with that area. Texas just does not feel like home anymore – it’s growing more crowded by the day, with our wonderful air quality I have sinus infections all the time, and the 101 degree days (for ten days in a row) in the summer are just killing me. So I’ve been dreaming of Wyoming, or Idaho, or Montana, for quite some time now. Whenever I read my “country living” magazines, I also find places like Virginia, Wisconsin, or Minnesota intriguing. There’s just something about living in a place that actually has seasons that appeals to me. However, I am often reminded by my husband and others that his job is here, and our family is here, and we own a home here, etc.

And I am often reminded that all of those places that I love have quite a bit of snow.

“Do you think you could actually handle that?” people will often ask me. “Your arthritis would probably be even worse than it is now.”

“I don’t know if I would like it or not,” I used to answer.

Now I feel like I’m at least getting the chance to have a small “test run” at living elsewhere, and so far, it’s okay. If nothing else, at least I can stomp through the snow, and for just a moment, I am “home”