TEXAS WEATHER

By Marion Kelley Bullock

Texas weather is a see-saw situation. One day it's 89*, the next, it's 40. Tonight, the temperature is predicted to drop to around 14*. And we may have snow! Once upon a time, we'd turn on the radio early, when snow fell, listening, hoping the announcer would declare a "snow day." That was when we still had children at home. You didn't have to be young to long for a snow day. And when I worked for the school system, I was as eager for a day off as were the children.

It was not a chance to sleep in. No, no! We were already up, checking to see if it was a snow day. It was a time to celebrate, to drink hot chocolate and eat cinnamon toast. Then we put on layer after layer of warm clothes, caps, scarves, and gloves, and out we'd go.

Our children and their friends made snow angels on our front lawn. A group of us, children and parents alike, rolled big balls of snow to stack one on top of another to form beautiful Frosty snowmen. "What can we use for a nose?" someone asked. "Eyes?" We gathered a carrot for a nose, sticks for arms, prunes or big buttons for eyes, caps, mufflers, and everything we could think of to make our creation the best.

In the meantime, we collected pans full of the cleanest snow we could find and when we'd had all the outdoor play we could stand, we made snow ice cream. A few of the neighborhood children ate their first snow ice cream at our house. Um-m-m, good.

Actually, we shoveled walks, too. But somehow that memory melted away, like the snowmen themselves. Isn't shoveling a little snow worth it, to have so much fun?