While we had flurries today and no accumulation, the snow is still over my boots. Out in the country everything is still bright white, my road buried under ice. The drive to and from school is an adventure, during which I pay visits to sides of the road I’d never intended to see up close, and slip along at angles that are unusual for a car that uses a road as a means to an end.
The ice on the pond now looks milky, like glaucoma eyes.
In class today I was discussing something or other with a Russian (Tatianya) and a Korean (Nayeon). Out of the blue Nayeon asked me, —”Don’t you have bad feelings about Tatianya, because of your country’s history with Russia?” I was taken aback. I told her that I was too young during the Cold War to think of Russia as anything but an amorphous threat, and certainly not as people. All I remember are names: Red Menace, Kruschev, stuff like that. But I admitted that we lived in fear of “the button,” and that Dad built a fallout shelter under our backyard, just to be safe. Sweet Tatianya said, of all things, “I’m sorry.”
“No. The fallout shelter was so cool. I loved playing in it.”
“We never would have pushed the button anyway. Russians aren’t like that. We were just trying to scare you.”
“Well,” I replied, “Americans DO push buttons. Lucky we didn’t.
Your BUTT looks milky, like glaucoma eyes. When I get there, I am going to dance about on the surface of that icy pond.
That is a very sweet and profound exchange with Tatianya. It pleases me.
Can you walk on the ice yet?
Yes, I can walk on the ice just perfectly, except when I’m falling on my ass, in which case I can sit on the ice just fine. And it is icy. I guess from now on the roads will be packed ice, because it sure ain’t getting warmer. Low twenties in the daytime and teens at night at the moment. It’s fun watching the lake get more and more fruz each day.