Snowy days, like drinks, bring back all the memories

A couple weeks ago, I blogged about drinks bringing back memories. On this Sunday, the snow is the culprit for the surge of memories, as I am remembering how much Chip and I loved snowy days together. We shared quite a few over the years, some with kids and some just the two of us (my personal favorites). We shoveled driveways together. We adventured out in them in his pickup truck (I always felt safe with him behind the wheel, even on the most treacherous of roads). We walked dogs and watched them frolic in the flakes falling from the sky. We spent many tipsy hours next to fireplaces and took long naps when the bourbon or Bloody Marys got the best of us. The memories are strong and vivid and, today, I am more sure than ever that J.M. Barrie was right when he once said “God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December.”

The Rockstar and I took a walk in today’s snow early this morning, and I thought about how much Chip would have loved walking in the snow and telling me stories. He would have described, in detail, sledding experiences with his siblings, and would have provided extra- details when telling the one about the time Charlie hit a rock while riding a sled in the yard and the ones of sledding at his grandparents’ home. If he had been ambling along in the snow with me and Rocky today, he would have told me about walking to get donuts at Donut Shack (since it never closed, not even in a snowstorm). He would have recalled memories of walking across the frozen desert while climbing Mount Vinson with his boys in Antarctica.

The snow would have brought back thousands of Chip’s memories and he would have shared them with me as if it were the first time he told them to me. I would have hung on his every word and each breath he took in between the familiar phrasing of the story, knowing the whole time how the story would go and how it would end. I would have been absorbed by the cadence of his voice and how the words flowed from his mind to mine. He knew I loved to hear his stories and his voice, and he would have obliged me in today’s snow just as he always did in every snowy day we shared together.

On my walk today, the snow told the stories. It quietly and softly told its story of how many times it has fallen on earth to feel the footsteps of man, woman and beast on it. The snow spoke of how it has been to mountaintops and beaches as well as to donut shops and shopping malls. It described, in the same detailed way that Chip would have provided me, how it has always fallen and will continue to fall until the end of time in order to remind us of those who have left this world, to prod us to love those who are here with us now as best we can, and to anticipate and prepare for the arrival of those who are yet to arrive.

The snow gently reminded me of the story of The Little Prince and how stars can provide an opportunity to laugh with someone who is no longer with you. The snow excitedly whispered “I have the same power as the stars!” and shared what Antoine de Saint-Exupéry wrote:

“And when your sorrow is comforted (time soothes all sorrows) you will be content that you have known me. You will always be my friend. You will want to laugh with me. And you will sometimes open your window, so, for that pleasure … And your friends will be properly astonished to see you laughing as you look up at the sky! Then you will say to them, ‘Yes, the stars always make me laugh!’ And they will think you are crazy. It will be a very shabby trick that I shall have played on you…”

With the stories told to me by the snow and Chip alongside those that live in my own head, the Rockstar and I now sit in the sunroom, ready to confront the day and all that it will bring. As my friend Veronica revealed to me this morning (as told to her by her brother), one can see the scenery or one can be part of the scenery. Today, I have decided that Chip, the snow, Rocky, me and everyone else I know is part of the scenery. And with that thought, this quote (from another Frenchman) comes to mind:

“The pain passes, but the beauty remains.” —Henri Matisse