My wife and I ran around yesterday photographing the snowpeople families made in the wake of Dallas’ biggest snowstorm ever — twelve inches in twenty-four hours — nothing by northern standards, but a thrill for those of us who live here.
What struck me about the photos we took was the variety:
• Snowpeople with green hats, top hats, straw hats, and (inevitably) cowboy hats
• Snowpeople with sunglasses, Mardi Gras beads, gloves, and scarves
• Snowpeople leaning over and looking sad, leaning on one another looking for support, leaning back as if they were doing the limbo
• Big snowpeople, little snowpeople
• Even what I am pretty sure was a snow dog
Building something in the snow invites creativity and self-expression. You don’t need money to buy snow. You have about the same amount as the person next door or the next neighborhood. There are no snowpeople critics. There is no style manual or set of regulations.
People feel free to express themselves. They do it without looking over their shoulder. More often than not they build them with someone else’s help and, for a few days, before the temperatures warm, they take a bit of pride in their creation.
We all need to find occasions in our lives to do that — and more often than the number of times it snows — especially in Dallas.
Our contribution here in Alabama was a snow rabbit, that my granddaughter Emma lovingly created. Children have the best sense of creativity! They just do what they think should be done. End of discussion. We had a family of snow people. The daddy (as Emma told me) fell over early on. The mother and the children were still doing their thing and the snow rabbit was right there in the midst of it. I guess you could say they were having a “good hare day”….I know…groan! Happy Valentine’s Day!