December 10, 2008 Wading through Snow (PG-13)

Reason # 234 that I love snow: It’s so ... clean.

Regardless of what the countryside looked like before a snowfall, once 6 inches of snow are draped across it, it looks gorgeous. Clean, sparkling, untouched… I wonder if snow is the reason that white was associated with purity in some cultures.

Yesterday, as I was walking from house to house during the 3id, I had to pick my way carefully. The melting snow had combined with the hard-packed dirt paths to create oceans of mud, quagmires for the unsuspecting foot.

Of course, that happens after every snowfall or heavy rain.

(PG-13 Rating takes effect … now.)

What made yesterday’s walking extra treacherous was that some of the mud wasn’t caused by water and dirt. Some was a mixture of blood and dirt.

There are well over a hundred households in Berberville, and each of them sacrificed a ram yesterday, which entails, among other things, draining all the blood. Rams are large – bigger than a golden shepherd, smaller than a Newfoundland – so that’s quite a lot of blood that was spilled yesterday. Gallons.

So the patches of red mud needed to be dodged even more carefully than the patches of squishy brown mud.

But then last night/this morning, snow fell. Something between 4 and 8 inches, though there was so much wind that the depth is different everywhere. Enough to frost all of Berberville like a wedding cake, and mantle over all the mud – of whatever provenance – of yesterday. Walking through this much snow is a challenge; in some places, it threatens to overtop my calf-high rubber boots. But it makes everything so beautiful – so clean – that I’m more than happy to push on through. :)