BLIZZARD DIARY FEB 2003

Copyright Michael Safdiah, 2003

February 17 6 am. Greenwich Village,

Monday morning -- The dawn hasn't even lit up the world here yet, and every part of Washington Street is barely visible, white. The air is all blinding snow. It bites at my face. I'd forgotten how exhilarating that can be. There are no boundaries between street, sidewalk, just a vast blank field of near white. Tops of nearby buildings dissolve into imagination. The distant muffled sound of shovels scraping pavement, moving thick, heavy snow. A comforting sign of life. Opening the door revealed over a foot of piled up snow against it. The world out here is dramatically hushed.

Blondie peeked out the door and become electric. I wondered how long it would take for her to get used to this new element. Around half a second, as it turned out. She just shot out the door without permission. Leaping into her new mysterious world, you could see how intensely she loved it. Tearing into a new excitement. It was safe. No cars could move in that snow. Mostly good natured neighbors, some walking their dogs, or making their way through the hardship we’re all enduring. Another boon that brings us together here in the West Village: our pets. She's in the middle of the road, chasing other dogs. They happen to be on leashes - she isn't. This pisses off some of the other owners, but I love to stand back and giving her the limelight. That's love as I see it. She's all tan against a tableau of white. Perfect.

Wow what a sight to see her romping in ass deep snow she never saw before.  She loves it! Just to watch her butt bounce up and down in it - that huge white world so totally new to her. Chasing and catching snowballs, exploding in her mouth as they land. Hurling her body into snow banks bigger than she is, totally trusting Life. Her nose covered with white.  A total retriever – chases anything I throw because God made her that way. It's all good, all fun.

She is pure unadulterated love, that dog. It's sad that such a wonderful light will, by her very Lab Retriever nature, be extinguished far too soon for me.  She’s already almost six, and shows no signs of slowing down. The candle that burns twice as bright… Knowing that makes whatever time we have all the more precious. She senses the value of every tiny moment.  I think she knows, and why she loves, and lives life as hard as she does.

This morning is one of those special times that make my heart sing. No -- soar. Happy moments that bring me back to loving life and knowing we're loved by God. Blondie, as a reminder of Live For Today. Why else all these gifts. Why indeed? Remember Peter Pan’s “Happy Thought?” Without one, you can’t fly. This is one of mine.

Back in New Bedford, Mom, my greatest gift, would bundle eight year-old me in so many layers of outers my arms just couldn’t budge – stuck straight out like a stick man -- and then she’d send me out to ‘play’ with the other kids. I was in deep, deep snow, back then we had REAL snow storms, not the sissy stuff you see here now. Well, it sure seemed deeper there and then. Two layers of pants just about guaranteed I wouldn’t be able to walk in it either. Robby the Robot would have been more graceful. No one would play with me. I couldn’t run, chase, throw snowballs, I was no fun at all. And you wonder why I turned out the way I did. Was mom over protective, you ask. I used to think so. Nah, she was just being a mom.

Another gift: a blessing that a storm grounded the lovers. Time to bond, and resolve, negotiate, and discover love.