Snow in Philadelphia

Perhaps it was the panic-stricken, frantic hours that held us in a tense freeze last time a major snow rolled in, but this snow fall felt calmer, more relaxed but also quieter - the neighbors didn't seem nearly so breathless and eager for contact this time (or did we just not leave our house long enough to notice?).

We stayed in for most of the day yesterday, avoiding the dreary grey sky and the drift - billowing thick and blurry, piling up outside our window as we watched in wide-eyed excitement.

But we had our moments in it, too - Friday night, after celebrating a friend's birthday with a warm, softly-lit dinner, we headed home in the few inches that had accumulated since our meal began, through a high-rise parking lot. While the lights overhead flickered on every now and then, sensing our movements, and amidst peeks outside by a furrowed-browed security guard, we balled up chunks of snow, stealthily running around poles and behind cars, trying our best to catch each other in moments of distraction. It was a snowball fight for the records: full of joyful screaching, sopping coats and gloves, and unabashed, irreverent clawing and stomping on the pristine stuff. We even lost a cell phone during the mischief (recovered only because the ringer was set on loud -- we called it over and over and over again, and finally found it, buried in white and nestled in a bush). And today, we walked in the sun, marched through snow up to our knees, built a proper snowman (snow lady, more precisely, complete with a hat), and made a few angels before coming home to cups of dark tea and hot winter chili.

This is, really, the only proper way to do a snowy weekend.