Snow Flurries

By Leticia Garcia Bradford

On a trip to Pyeongtaek, South Korea, visiting my grandchildren and daughter for the winter holidays comes this blog story:

It came upon a winter’s day. Snow! My first snow living in snow country. The billowy flakes blew around in pillowy drifts. With so much excitement, I felt like a kid on my first adventure in the snow. Being warm inside the house watching the flurries like tiny popcorn float down and cover everything in white is one thing. Heading out in the cold is another. Bundling up to go outside to play is a process of patience.

On the first day, Miranda, Baby Nathaniel and I went for a snow walk. The excitement of my first snow was so refreshing: breathing in the cold air and exhaling frost mist. When Aurora and Francesca came home from preschool, Nate and I stayed inside protected from the cold, while the girls played in the snow wearing their mittens, snow bibs, jackets, hats and scarves. I watched from the window with warmth in my heart, witnessing mother and daughters joyously playing in the cold snow.

On the second day, two adults, two toddlers and one baby ventured outside for a snow picnic. The bundling process again and I’m always the last one ready. The girls were on an adventure to find snow beans. Lola, my grandma name, carried the snow food and a bulky canister of holiday popcorn. The Korean Cultural Center was a short distance down the country road and we walked along frozen and melting snow through the neighborhood with houses scattered amongst frozen rice paddies.

Everywhere you looked was draped in white. At the Center, we set up under an awning with our blanket. The snow beans, a bag of holiday mint M & M’s, were found after mom had flung them over the previously green lawn and we ate our picnic snacks. No one sat down because of the cold and because of the lure of expansive snow available to make fresh tracks: Irresistible! I couldn’t stop running around and trying to make snow hearts with my boots. The Center had holiday music playing and I couldn’t have been happier dancing in the snow while the tiny flakes descended upon my face. After gleaning the perfect icicle, I was surprised to find the icy treat was sharp where I pierced my tongue.

“Could this be the perfect murder weapon?” That was my daughter’s input.

While the exhilaration of my first snow was rejuvenating, snow excitement runs it’s course. First, the snow gets dirty and melts into black ice which makes walking difficult because of the fear of finding my rump in a heap of snow or worse in a puddle of muddy freezing water. Then, as the snowing stops it starts to melt making even more mud. The next day, when the sun had come out I began to wonder if the snow had all been a dream, with little reminders of the fun we’d had the day before.

No worries for me. I’m in South Korea until January and the hope that I’ll get my first White Christmas will be a dream come true.

Leticia Garcia Bradford performs around the SF East Bay at open mics and readings. She finds herself a poet, a playwright and a pharmacy techinician. She is the founder of the B Street Writers Collective in Hayward, CA. To find out if she got her White Christmas check out her My New Adventure Blog at leticiagarciabradford.blogspot.com. Leticia’s Blog at lgbradford.blogspot.com has her poems and other stories.