We've Got A Reputation To Uphold

Pennsylvania is not a state you think of for horrible winter conditions, or even excessive snow, but our particular county has a reputation for winter nastiness that is well earned. We can be an hour away in Pittsburgh, or three hours downstate, or the whole way across the country, but if we tell people where we're from, and they've ever been here, it's predictable what they'll say.

"Wow, your winters are horrible."

Sometimes, that'll be followed by, "Isn't that where Flight 93 went down?" or some other reason for remembering our location on the map, but if anyone has ever been here in the wintertime, they'll remember it. And nine and a half chances out of ten, it won't be a pleasant memory. Cars get stuck on the turnpike, travelers get snowed in and can't get out, freak snow storms dump several feet of snow overnight and shut down roads. But hey, we've got decent skiing, so there's that. Except we don't ski. Of course.

This weekend, we got a jump start on keeping up our winter reputation. That nor'easter that hit the east coast hit us pretty hard as well. For the first time ever, we cancelled the corn maze due to snow. That is something I hope never happens again. Enough snow in October to cancel an event is just WRONG.

But a very strange thing happened this weekend that I just didn't predict. Besides the snow. I love it. The snow, that is. I loved  the snow. I have always loved winter, but the last two we've had have been rather excessive, and I declared myself So.Over.Winter. In fact, I was So.Over.Winter that I was living in mortal dread of this year's snow. It was next thing to a panic attack coming on every time I'd think of winter. I think it's most disturbing because I'm far too young to be a snow bird.

But when I woke up Saturday morning to this:

I was Christmas morning kind of giddy. I hated myself for loving it, but that didn't change the fact that I did. How can you NOT love the beauty of that? Gosh, it's breathtaking. That was Saturday. On Sunday, it started to warm up enough to melt off, but we're still left with way too much in October.

Luke spent his Sunday afternoon making this.

And while it's very impressive, and something that he'll probably never EVER do again in October (THANKGOODNESS), it doesn't diminish the wrongness of it.

So just for the record, I am now over winter. For the year. If what we have now just melted off into spring, and lasted through until June when it slowly warmed into summer, I'd not complain. Unfortunately, we live in Somerset, the county with a reputation to uphold. And this county takes it's reputation seriously.