It May Snow

With snow in the forecast there is a palpable energy in the air at my workplace. If you recall from reading this blog then you know I work at a school. And I loathe snow days. Where teachers are as excited as the kids and share black magic to make sure it works (Flush ice cubes down the toilet! Don't say it aloud! Wear your pajamas inside out!) my mind is a lame tiger in the zoo, pacing up and down. This makes it sound powerful but its only anxious with all the could happen and what I should be doing.

I worry about the old building and its single pan windows and well settled brick walls. Where we plan to tuck point seeps water into a room and drips over the desk of a therapist. "Did you know it leaks over my desk?"

I do and there is not much I can do until spring. And its not new.

I worry about drafts wisping in where the caulk on windows has flaked away. The landlord turns the heat off a night in a seemingly efficient yet truly counter-intuitive move. "Don't worry if we open all the doors and leave this fan on enough warm air will move around and nothing will freeze" The chill cracks the branches on the Chinese Elms outside who drop clumps of leaves in shapes of witch's brooms.

What the chill is good for is the racks of computers which run hot with lots of streaming bandwidth but then keep cool in an AC of inefficiency. It forces mice to ground and makes a lot of people happy which even in my winter curmudgeon I am not immune to "I need this snow day," many staff say and I believe them. The day after snow days my legs ache with that "I just worked out earlier" stiffness. Not because of any effort removing snow but from crouching in a crawl space to chase steam leaks from our crawl space. "Oh, this is going to suck" as I clamber over a hot pipe making sure avoid cooking everything below my waist.

Snow days make me stay at home with my kids. Have arguments with my wife over who gets to stay. Its the kitty cat game the kids inevitably play where they circle around each other until one "accidentally" hurts the other and, with a justifiable cause, begin a wrestling war of scratches and bear hugs. Its juggling grilled cheese sandwiches to drop in front of the kids and the cycle of tablets that have run out of energy while I try to knock out one more email. Or that Home Alone I just forgot something feeling when you get the text "Hey, no one is here!" And I realize I forgot to tell the cleaner not to come in.

Its day dreaming when there is peace and watch the fat flakes drop and the nebulae of salt build up on the road way and on the aching floorboards of my vestibule. Day dreaming of checking things off the list and everyone in their sweat pants at home catching up or binge watching TV. And when they end its a sudden race to get things done that needed me physically in the building. I am humbled by the winter's ability to waylay us (even when everyone says it used to be worse or shouldn't people just deal) but I find little delight in it. Its a storm. With all potential to damage and sap.