Another essay written on behalf of my school
by Curl on 2005年09月09日 03:18 PM
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Since I am from South Carolina in the warm, southern part of America, I’m not used to seeing more than a few centimeters of snow every year. When I was a student, it was usual for school to be cancelled two or three days each year because of snow. Whenever the news predicted just a small amount of snow, all the supermarkets would be crowded, as people rushed to buy bread and milk to prepare for the shutdown. With the time away from school, my family would go into the area behind my house and go sledding or have snow ball fights. Whenever there was enough snow, we would also make snowmen, but there wasn’t always enough. A few days later, the last bit of snow would melt away, and everything would return to normal for the year.
Since I had never seen very much snow, I was nervous before coming back to Toyama after Winter vacation. On the airplane ride from America, I looked down as we flew over Canada and Alaska, and thought about all the snow down below. It’s unbelievable how big the world is. We would fly for hours and hours, only passing one tiny town the whole time. It’s tiny lights would be surrounded by a dark and icy world around it. It’s amazing where people can live.
Since I kept thinking about how much snow there was in the world on my trip, I wasn’t surprised when I got off the train in Takaoka, and everything was covered in snow. But I was surprised to see that snow was falling then and there. It looked like a special salt, used perhaps for giant pretzels or homemade ice cream. Snow filled the air remorselessly. The streets were made into a slushy froth, because Toyama’s temperature is just over the freezing point. As predicted by Toyama veterans before I left, nozzles built into the highway swept the snow on the streets into a soupy stew. It wasn’t as bad as the icebergs of the Hudson Bay, but it impressed me nevertheless.
Of course, this year is known for having very little snow, which makes its even more surprising to me. My apartment was very cold at first, since my kerosene heater would not turn on. I had to wear a coat even in my own living room!
On the brighter side, the snow here is much less apt to soak through clothing than the snows I experienced as a youth. The simple explanation for this is that aging has dampened my enthusiasm for playing in snow. And since I don’t play in snow, it doesn’t get into my clothing.
Oh, years, pass not swiftly!
The crunch of snow underfoot still fascinates me, as does the sight of snow precipitating. Snow here comes in flecks like dandruff and wisps like down. It can be a tiny white mustard seed or an albino peppercorn. Whatever the size or shape, it seems to coat every surface in the outside world.
And yet, in a few days, the snow had receded. There were narrow paths of relatively easy navigation, and a few spots of pavement even shone through to the surface. A little while later, you only the rice fields had snow, and soon you could even see the plants that were hidden there.
I was sad to imagine that winter could be ending already. If you have to be cold either way, at least snow provides an interesting diversion to those outside. I have yet to create a snowman, even one of a rudimentary style, nor have I seen any lining the streets or playgrounds. I can’t imagine where in this dense cityscape one could sled safely and haven’t even seriously entertained the idea of searching for such a place. It’s a shame that age has suppressed my sense of the joyous possibilities of snow. I wonder if the children of Toyama, having faced deluge each winter of their lives, get the same pleasure out of snow that I did when I was a child. Perhaps they do have some affection for snow, but if so, they have hidden such signs from me. It may be that only those who have very little snow can appreciate how different it is.
Still, even though I am too old to play in the snow, I try to cultivate an eye for the purple mountains and slick, white rice fields. Winter in Toyama seems to have gathered the colors that autumn should have been using and put them into the sunsets and tinted all the snowy eaves of the buildings rose and peach. Dancing snowflakes replace falling leaves nicely and even the sloshed up roads have a kind of chaotic elegance like a leaf strewn forest floor.