Snow doesn’t bother me. As long as I don’t have to drive in it…! In fact, I quite like it.

So knowing that there was going to be snow while I’m visiting my beloved niece in Boston, I came prepared. I thought… I brought face scarves (which I forgot to wear today!), an ear/headband, gloves, even hiking boots with good tread.

I just didn’t figure on WIND. And windchill! And slick! I mean, there’s already snow on the ground, so this new snow shouldn’t be slick, right?? Riiiight.

Being (relatively) intrepid, I set out from my niece’s home for the nearby library. Given the governor’s warning that ‘nonessential’ personnel shouldn’t go out, we decided that going in to Boston on a day w/ closed museums and drifts of snow probably wasn’t my best plan. But hey — I can walk six blocks, right?

And I certainly can. Good traction on the old boots! However, I didn’t figure on a windchill of THREE DEGREES! Sheesh.

But it’s so beautiful…

Now safe & warm at the local library, cosy in my two layers of snuggly sweaters and central heat, I can hear the voices of immigrants learning English in the classroom next to me. It warms me, knowing that despite the vitriol in the news, people are still coming to America. As my family did a century or more ago. As yours did, too, almost certainly.

I’m surrounded by books, and the quiet of readers & writers. I couldn’t ask for warmer company.

Plus the knowledge that tonight my wonderful niece — who asked me to come see her! — will sit in her lovely home w/ me is another glow. We’ll trade stories like motherhood cards, as a new life grows inside her. While her husband attends a distant business meeting, we’ll curl up in her warm living room, or sit across from each other at the kitchen table (the best place for conversation!) and link generations.

Somehow, the sting of snow is a very small price to pay for these kinds of warmth.