Ice, baby.

Today in Memphis there is a bout of freezing rain, and sleet. I haven't seen the sleet but it has rained a little bit. All the schools are closed. Everyone is worried about groceries and extra propane heaters. It's 32 degrees, folks. The low is only 25.

I recall sitting, hopefully watching the news ticker in elementary school and hoping school would be off. School closings weren't often, even when you already had several feet of snow on the ground. I remember wearing snow pants and all the snow gear you can think of for the walk to school most mornings, after school was, as usual, open. There could be five feet of snow, and drifts much taller than my nine years, and school would go on. We'd build igloos and forts and snowmen on the playground at recess.

After living in the south for 4 years, snow is but a fond memory. We have an inch dusting here and there, and then of course the dreaded ice. I think about the way up North we would be a half mile off on the soccer field digging under drifts of snow...it's amazing no kid ever had the snow collapse on them and trap them. We'd get a group of kids together and roll colossal snow balls, and pile them on top of each other, then climb on them and jump off into drifts. And we weren't scared. We knew snow like that, it was like a part of our genes to understand it. You learned early how to dig out of a collapsed drift. Our families were hardy, red-cheeked...heck, frostbite was a byword. The boat welders in the factory north of my small hometown welded on, my dad and uncles and every other grown man I was aware of worked without ceasing at the Redman homes plant at the south end, no matter the weather.

I'm not trying to say at all that the South is full of ineffectuals that can't handle a little snow and ice. I really enjoy the South, and it's culture. It's manners, it's food, it's art, it's music...there is no denying it is unique and special in it's own right.

It is that ingrained culture, the same sum total of ways of living built up by a group of human beings and transmitted from one generation to another that makes me smirk when going out in the "worst storm of the winter" is forbidden here. It's the culture of the north that is in my bones, it is every learned behavior I am speaking of, and the knowledge of it leaves me unable to concede that it's winter here. This is not the winter I was taught to respect because of it's mightiness. Winter weather in the north took over your life, shaped the way you lived for half of the year.

The ice is the terrible thing here. There is no snow to pack, so the ice takes over and it's largely invisible.

I think what I dislike about winter here is that it is sneaky, and subtle, but it still chills you to the bone.

I saw a sled for sale in the hardware store we pick up goat feed at, and pointed it out to the kids...they weren't quite sure what it was.