A Fancy Snow Angel
I awoke early this morning., even before the birds began their morning praise songs. I thought of the reports of snow in some of the southern states yesterday and how VT has, so far, not had any big snowfalls this season. Thinking of snow reminded me of how we used to get lots of snow when I was in grade school. Funny how one thought leads to another and yet another! Soon I boarded my time machine and was off to the days of yore!
I traveled back to a wintery day when I was in 4th grade in the small, brick, two room schoolhouse in a little Vermont village. As I stepped out of my time machine into a white wonderland of fresh fallen snow, in my woolen snow pants, tall boots, knitted toque, mittens and scarf, I spotted my best friend, Madelyn's bright mittened hand beckoning me to join her. It was recess and we headed to the little hill in back of the schoolhouse. Other girls from our class were there too. We had a plan to make snow angels against the hill. If only we could keep the boys from messing up the pure undisturbed snow long enough for us to make our angels. They decided to leave us to our 'dumb game' and go have a snowball fight somewhere else, so we got in a line, a good arm's length apart. We plopped down and laid back in the snow. Slowly we brought our straight arms up from our sides, up and up, all the way to our heads and back down again. Nice wings! Our legs went out a ways at the same time to make our angel's skirt. The sky from here is so pretty, a deep cerulean blue, no clouds! Then we sat up carefully and were given a tug to our feet by a friend. We jumped away from the angel so as not to mess her up. Standing back they looked so fine all in a line! Then the bell rang...recess over! Mad dash for the schoolhouse!
Our school had two rooms and a generous hallway in between. There were 3 grades to a room...1-3 in one room, the little room....4-6 in the other, the 'big room'. We all rushed into the nice, warm building. I can still smell that schoolhouse smell of books and papers and the wonderful warmth upon coming in from a cold winter day.
It took awhile to get out of our wet winter gear. (No nylon back then, that the snow didn't cling to! )
Our wool ski pants were just covered! Hats, scarves and mostly our mittens looked as if the snow fairy had embellished them with tiny white pearls! We race for the radiators located around the room and toss our wet, pearly mittens on them, hearing the hiss as they plop down, and smelling the wool as it gets hot.
Our teacher and the older kids helped get the snow pants hung up to dry.
Then Mrs. Hammond would sit down at the old piano that someone had painted a sea foam green and begin to play some marching music. Our fingers and toes tingling, our cheeks flaming and our hair standing on end from yanking off the toques, we marched in time to the music around the rows of desks, up one aisle and down the next, around the back and to the front. Toes warmer now, we take our seats.
Teacher continues to play as we settle down. We request our favorite, The Black Hawk Waltz. All is quiet now as we listen and watch her hands fly over the keys of the old piano. We want more, so she plays it through one more time. It calms our exuberant spirits and we are ready to begin our book learning. We have learned so much already! Helping one another, music appreciation and how to be respectful and orderly.
So now the 6th grade is instructed to read quietly from Prose and Poetry, the 5th grade to study their Spelling words and the 4th grade will have it's Geography class. We read today of a barefoot boy named Bunga The Jungle Boy, who's skin is black, who lives somewhere in Africa where there is no snow and who has yams for dinner!
I go to sharpen my pencil and look out the window. The sun makes the snow sparkle, and the angels, all in a row, lie peacefully against the hill .
Now the birds begin to sing in real time... I must have returned to the present... Sixty years later. I still smell those hot woolen mittens hissing on the radiators!
Have a pleasant day... hop in your time machine and see where it takes you!
Snow Angels in the making!
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