(We've had about 8 inches of snow since this photo was taken from the deck--plus lots of wind, which has created bigger drifts.) I suppose it's not surprising that weather is a big topic of discussion in a country this large, especially because the country reaches "from sea to sea to sea," as they say.
However, people in central Canada seem to have mixed feelings about the country's weather. For the past few weeks, Canada AM has run features about preparing for the traditional wintry weather. Last weekend's tri-part storm is still making the news, in part because the aftereffects (flooding and continued rain) are so devastating in the "Pacific Southwest." Do they dread it? Are they proud of it? I can't always tell.
When I moved here, people loved to tell me how difficult I would find their winters. Even when I said I'd lived in Colorado for nearly 10 years, they rolled their eyes and told me horror stories about how much worse it would be here. It's as if they didn't want me to succeed at (a) learning to live with the winters here or (b) enjoying myself during winters. For a nation that has a reputation for being polite, these diatribes seemed awfully unfriendly.
I've since decided talking about the weather with locals is like talking about your extended in-laws. Only family members can say bad things about their own family. You are not allowed to do more than agree with some statements--and it's better if your response is "mmm" instead of an enthusiastic "yeah, I hate it when she...."
And I can understand that attitude. After all, I chose to live here, so I really can't complain. Plus, I actually knew full well what I could be getting into. All during my growing-up years, my mother (much like the Canadians I met here three years ago) made dark and dire comments about "snow on the ground from Thanksgiving till Memorial Day--and that's Canadian Thanksgiving!" She never really caught on that the development of fleece and windproof outerwear would make it fun to play in the snow.
Still, I was plenty nervous about moving here, and I was glad for my five years in the New Mexico mountains, plus ten years (give or take) in Colorado. In New Mexico, I learned to drive a manual transmission car in snow in a hilly town. (Driving in snow is possible; driving in the ice of my native Oklahoma is something else again.) In Colorado, I learned the differences between ranges of cold temperatures--after a few days of zero to ten F, "freezing" weather feels substantially warmer because it is some 30 degrees warmer (duh). In both places, I learned that a little snow doesn't necessarily bring life to a halt.
Mostly, in three autumns here and plenty of years before those, I've learned that my attitude makes all the difference in how I experience winter. The snow this year came earlier than I anticipated it would. I wasn't very well prepared in some ways. However, I have adjusted. It helps to have the right accessories--boots, scarves, mittens, socks.
But mostly, I have only to see the beauty in the falling snow and in the crisp sunny days, look out my window to watch the buck gnawing at the sticks of the lilac bush, and remember that today's snow slush and muck becomes next summer's lake. And that makes all the scraping of windshields well worth it.
