First Snow

I was blessed today to spend a few hours with a good friend over chai lattes, sitting behind the glass of the coffee shop window watching the first snow of autumn. We watched hooded people come and go along the sidewalk while the wind twisted and twirled in jackets of white flakes like a thousand invisible dancers. I don't know what it is about snow that I love so much, but it feels so final and concilatory, like nature tucking you in under the blanket, lulling everything into a peaceful white silence. Soft and forgiving as feathers.

Good memories from my childhood are blanketed in snow. Many of them involve visiting my grandparents in their home on Vancouver Island at Christmas, amidst the farms and forests. Excitement would mount as we pulled up the steep wooded driveway of their property under the thick canopy of cedar and fir, the view of chimney smoke puffing away on a whispy wind while warm lights shone like beacons from within. As we climbed the wooden steps to the house, my grandma would open the door and hold her arms wide to claim me, bellowing out professions of total adoration and love. As she held me tight in her embrace, she would chirp on and on to me, calling me everything under the sun that was cute or sweet. "My little pudding! My little sparrow! Look how my little muffin has grown!", she would shout while burying me in her arms. And I loved every minute of it.

At grandma's place, I reigned supreme. I saw her house as my palace. Nestled in a wooded wonderland, it was like an elven paradise, with crystal chandelliers and sheep skin rugs by the fire, and large framed paintings of mythical beasts and angels. The place had a distinct smell that was both sweet and earthy, like tea and flowers and toast.

My grandmother was nothing too unlike Galadriel herself, gliding around the house like an elven queen, humming in her high sweet voice to the rhythms of Mozart or Bach. I would nestle myself under a special knitted blanket by the fire and watch the coloured lights on the Christmas tree glisten like jewels as I braided the hair of my dolls. And when I wasn't doing that, I was apparently putting on a performance on the coffee table. I have no recollections of these preformances, but I have seen pictures of my chubby two year old self in diapers and a knitted shawl, arms raised as if conducting a symphony, my expression one of greatness and deep concentration.

I also remember one particular day when I walked through the woods between my grandma and grandpa, each one holding my hand to keep me from slipping on the trail. We would walk together along those quiet forest paths, the odd small bird alighting on heavy branch and shaking it free of snow, the sound so gentle and serene. My grandpa would point out racoon and fox trails, and I would pummel them with questions about where the creatures in the forest were spending Christmas, and did they get presents, too.

There isn't a first snow that does not remind me of those days, where everything in the world was good and beautiful and special.

A number of years ago I actually moved to a small cabin that was only a couple of miles away from that magical place of my childhood. The first year I lived in that cabin, I couldn't bring myself to walk down the road to my grandparent's old home. I didn't want to shatter those precious memories that sustained me through so many dark times by looking upon a strange and ordinary house. But on the day of the first snowfall in the second year I lived at my cabin, I hopped in my truck and drove down the road. As I slowly cruised by houses and farms, I scanned the landscape looking for traces of times long ago, but it was as if I had never seen that road before. New houses replaced the old forest and farmland I once knew. It seemed like I drove forever, and I began to doubt that the old house was any longer there. I kept looking to the left as I drove, thinking it had to be there somewhere. But nothing. I suddenly felt an impending sense of grief and loss as I scanned that road like a child searching empty pockets.

But then, as I neared the end of the road by a fenced lumberyard and was about to turn back, there it was. As if it had appeared out of nowhere, strange and displaced. I sat there in my idling truck, looking up the steep driveway to the house with smoking chimney. All I could hear was the sound of the ivy covered cedars dripping wet snow onto forest floor, and a dog barking in the distance. How I wanted to see that door open with my grandmother standing there, arms wide to greet me. I tried to imagine myself there as the little girl I was, having arrived at her sanctuary where the world was all magic and wonder. And for a moment, it was there. But as fast as the vision came, it was gone, and I was just a stranger gazing at a house that was no longer mine to cherish.

I returned to my cabin that day feeling strange at having visited an empty shell that used to house something of such value for me. But in truth, the essence of those things never leave us, and we recreate them in other ways in all that we do. It was in this spirit that I reached for the old knitted blanket that I used to wrap around myself at my grandma's house, plugged in my Christmas lights, and sat by the fire to watch the first snow.