Grownup Snow Days

You go to bed wishing, hoping, praying. You can barely sleep all night. You wake up in the middle of the night and run to the window to see what it looks like outside. You wake up at 5am, turn on the TV and watch for your school at the bottom of the screen. You’re hoping for a SNOW DAY.

I remember those nights growing up all too well. Since we don’t get a lot of snow here when we do it basically shuts everything down and you’re pretty much guaranteed at least one snow day a winter.

Those were the elementary school, jr. high and high school days. No school = play day/snow day/fun day.

{said play day/snow day/fun day senior year of high school}

Then you get to college.

I’ll never forget my sophomore year we were expecting a huge ice storm. The UA kept sending out emails saying they hadn’t closed school for snow/ice ever. (Maybe it wasn’t ever, but it was like 30 years or something crazy.) So I wasn’t expecting school to be cancelled and I definitely wasn’t expecting school to be cancelled for a week, but that’s certainly what happened – The Great Ice Storm of 2009. There are a lot of things I’ll never forget about that week. Let’s just put it this way, we were the only people who had power so we had about 10-12 people staying with us for a week. Infer from that what you will.

While that was awesome, it wasn’t quite as exciting as snow days growing up because guess what your assignments are still due the same day they were due before the ice-pocalypse. Your teachers can email you. You can email assignments to your teachers. Sometimes I curse technological advancements.

{a huge part of The Great Ice Storm of 2009 was beating Mario on Nintendo 64}

We actually ended up having two more of these storms while I was in college, not near as bad as 2009, but just as entertaining. During Snow Storm 2010 I’ll never forget is walking 2 miles to Gusano’s for pizza. Totally worth it.

Read my blog post “What I’ve Learned in College, Snow Days Edition” here.

{Snow Storm 2010 walk to Gusano’s}

But here’s the thing. I’m not in high school any more. I’m not in college any more. I’m not a kid waiting by the window any more. Now I’m an adult with a real job that doesn’t close because of snow or ice. We have computers. We have blackberrys. We have deadlines and projects and social media. (which never sleeps!) A snow day does not mean a play day anymore. So as I watch the snow out the window and read about the impending overnight ice, it’s not quite as exciting as it use to be. But hey, c’est la vie, and one thing I am looking forward to is the day I have kids of my own and I get to see their excitement for a snow day.

xo xo