One of the most popular posts on Facebook is Throwback
Thursday. People usually post photos taken in their younger years, which is a fun way of creating an online
gallery of their lives. In honor of the Snow Blizzard that bore down on my home
state of New York this week, I thought I thought I’d share some “snow” back memories from
my years growing up in the Empire State.
I spent the first six years of my life in a very small town
(maybe 300 people) one mile from the Canadian border in upper New York
State. Winter was always a challenging
time for my family, but as a kid I enjoyed it thoroughly. Even in the winter I
loved to play with my cousins on my grandparents’ front porch. The snow
dripping from the roof onto the porch overhang would refreeze at night and
produce amazing stalactite and stalagmite icicles as big as six inches around
and three or four feet long. We would break off a length of ice to hold in our
mittens to suck on and sometimes to use as a sword. We totally ignored the
taste of roof soot in our Popsicle.
The annual Sugar Social at the Methodist Church was a much
anticipated event. In March when the maple sap was rising in the trees, it was
collected in buckets, then boiled down to make thick syrup. Fresh snow was
gathered in big metal pans and the syrup was poured on the snow instantly
making maple syrup taffy—a delicious treat.
I fought many battles from the snow forts I helped to
construct. A mound of snowballs was stored for the inevitable snowball fight
that would follow. It was mostly the boys against the girls and sometimes I was
on the winning side.
I moved away from that rural lifestyle and eventually ended
up in Georgia where snow is an exception and not the rule. One winter I
returned to the place of my birth to visit my father who was very sick with cancer.
The closest airport to my small town was several hours away, so my sister and I
had to drive on icy roads to reach our destination. Snow drifts covered all the
surrounding farmland as far as my eye could see. The full moon rose over the
horizon and cast an ethereal glow on the snow laden fields. It was a beautiful sight and a much needed
reminder of God’s beauty in the midst of human suffering.
Here’s hoping for snow this year in Georgia—enough to shut down the
roads for a few days, but not enough to affect the power lines. The world will
stop and peace and quiet will prevail until the temperature rises again.
A Bible verse about snow: Isaiah 55:10-11 "For as the rain and the
snow come down from heaven, And do not return there without watering the earth
And making it bear and sprout, And furnishing seed to the sower and bread to
the eater; So will My word be which goes forth from My mouth; It will not return
to Me empty, Without accomplishing what I desire, And without succeeding in the
matter for which I sent it.”
