Snowy Reflections

Snow, Snow everywhere, except here in FL, Hawii and Louisiana. That is what is being said today---unbelievable!! Never have I experienced what some of my family and several of my friends are going through right now. The records have been broken for the amount of snow that has fallen. My sister, Pam, in Texas is getting snow as I write this. She says she will make a snowman and post her pictures on "FaceBook".

I have two big snow stories to tell. These did not happen when I was a little girl, but took place when I was a grandmother.

My grandson, Christopher, was four years old when we made a trip to Arkansas in December 1989. We knew it would be cold and had prepared with warm clothes. The trip was very long and Christopher was sick with a stomach virus on the way. When we finally arrived at our destination, we were greeted with an unexpected snowfall.

The people we traveled with had family that owned a "Bed and Breakfast" in the mountains of Arkansas. The cottage was warm and cozy while outside became a blanket of white wonder.

The next morning, as we were walking in the snow to the main house for breakfast, Christopher saw his first glimpse of snow. He reached his bare hand down into it and discovered it was very cold. We had so many clothes on, that it took a while to get ready to sit down to a gourmet country breakfast. The temperature outside was the coldest I have ever experienced in my life. I beleive it was 13 degrees below freezing. This was one of several vacations that were very memorable.

My other snow story was when my family got together in December, 1993. This is a story that many of my family also remembers, each one having their own story.

My husband and I drove to Maryland with our two grandchildren, Christopher was eight and Amber was three. We stayed with my niece Christine. My sister, Michele, had a Christmas party at her house on Christmas night. My sister, Pam and her husband and seven children drove from Texas to be with the family that year. We had not all been together in a very long time.

Christine, her husband and little girl, Calina, had left the party before we did. We got a call from Christine saying it was snowing really hard. She had managed to get home and thought we should all leave before it got any worse on the roads. It was too late.

We rode around for hours trying to find roads that could be traveled leading us back to Christine's and Lynn's. At one point, Lynn and Pam's family had bladders about to burst. What a sight seeing all these people running out behind a school. Feeling better, we continued our journey. We reached a main road, Rockville Pike, Stewart and I knew where we were because we used to live in the town of Rockville. We decided to find a hotel and said goodbye to my sisters who continued on their journey and did make it home.

We were given the last room available in that hotel and very grateful to be off the road. Christopher was so happy and said he was afraid that he was going to wet his pants if we had to stay in the car any longer.

Sleeping in my sequined sweater was not my favorite thing to do. The fact that I did not have any clean under clothing did not make me happy either. We were able to get back to Christine's the next day and made our plans to leave and go back to Florida.

The trip back was an experience also. The traffic crawled down the highway due to the treacherous condidtions of the roads. We were unable to get to the hotel we had a reservation for. Stewart called and got us into a hotel that was not too far from where we were. Again, it was the last room available. We were all very glad to get home to bright and sunny Florida.

I have not seen snow since.