Molly in particular has been wrestling with some of these differences. Perhaps because kids don't fully understand that the world is not the same everywhere, and that the world is bigger than the particular place they live. While Cincinnati, OH had much milder winters than East Lansing, MI and was far less adept at snow removal, the term "snow day" had meaning, and you could count on at least one or two a year. Every morning Molly races downstairs and flips through the news channels, her eyes desperately scanning the bottom of the screen for school closings. Every morning she whines about how unfair it is that she has to go to school, especially today when she hopped on her email and discovered that even her Michigan friends got a snow day today. She sees the mountains of snow outside her window and fails to comprehend why the Universe cannot grant her even a delay. I try to direct her eyes to the road somewhere beyond the tall, white expanse of our front yard to the perfectly clear street. We have hills as tall as Cincinnati's, but Syracuse has an all-star snow removal team that is not afraid of a a few inches of snow. The snow plows are like prehistoric creatures, with shovels as wide as a side street. I was driving out in the country on Monday after 8 inches had fallen overnight, and I was driving on pavement. This is unheard of in the previous places we have lived. The forecast for the next 48 hours is such: 1 to 2 inches predicted today, 2-3 more inches predicted tonight, 1 to 2 inches predicted for tomorrow. Nobody breaks into regular programming. No red alerts show up on the screen. No one blinks because this is normal and the snow will be taken care of by the amazing snow removal dinosaurs of Syracuse. So here's a new joke: How many inches of snow does is take to get a snow day in Syracuse? Molly does not think this is funny. I'll let you know if and when I get an answer.
Molly came home from school yesterday describing an interaction with her science teacher in complete astonishment. They are studying natural disasters, and the teacher and Molly somehow got in a conversation about tornadoes. Teacher asked Moll if her former school had ever done a tornado drill. Molly, with surprise, replied that she had participated in many over the course of her schooling. The teacher asked her how it worked. Molly explained. The teacher asked her to demonstrate the tucked position in the hallway, because she was having trouble visualizing this. Molly did (poor kid! Bet that was fun to do in front of all the gawking classmates). The teacher, very excited, exclaimed that maybe they could do a mock tornado drill the next day. Molly could not believe that this was being viewed as a novelty. The teacher asked if there were lots of tornadoes in the Midwest, and Molly told her about the summer two years ago when the sirens went off every day one week in June. Teacher asked if Molly had ever been in a tornado, and Molly told her about the time she was, at Klinger Lake with her grandparents. As Molly related all this, she clearly, as a Midwesterner, could not imagine that the place she lives does not experience tornadoes, or at least not enough to ever even practice a drill at school.
This is a much happier part of Upstate/Central New York for Moll. Fewer snow days - boooooo. Fewer tornadoes? Heaven for Molly. It's a trade she might be willing to make. Well, maybe not at 6:30 am on a weekday in winter....
2 comments:
It totally cracks me up that Molly was an expert on tornadoes and drilled to that effect. Although, around here people are shocked by the depth of our experiences with them, too. Although here, we have people from the south who lived through Katrina and lived in a FEMA trailer afterward...
18. 18 inches in 24 hours gets ya a snow day in Syracuse. Too bad we were out of town....
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