The Sound of Snow Falling

Words cannot describe the beauty of snow. Especially when it is falling in your own backyard!

For those of you who see snow more regularly, you may not understand what the big deal is. Allow me to explain. We live in Arizona where there is not much snow. Some parts of our city get snow occasionally because of the slightly higher elevation, but in our area, we have never gotten snow in the five or six years we have been here. It was so exciting to have it right there! 

Pat looked like he wasn't sure what to do with it.

My reaction to it was a little bit delayed because I had a coaching call scheduled five minutes after we realized it was snowing. For the first half of the call, I gushed to my coach Stephanie while gazing dreamily out my window at the gentle white flakes fluttering down. It was so beautiful!

 Dad came home for lunch and we went on a cactus Crusade to find a saguaro cactus with snow on it. It was a bit more challenging than we thought it would be since it was fading fast. However, one of the criteria for the cactus was that it had to have arms and there are few saguaro cacti with arms in our neighborhood, due to the fact that a cactus generally doesn't grow arms until it is 75 years of age, and then each arm represents approximately 50 years of life. But our cactus couldn't not have arms! Arms are the epitomy of cactus-ness!

Once I got off my coaching call, I was texting all my friends like crazy! I got on Facebook to post about it and my entire newsfeed was all about snow. It made me feel so happy inside to see all of Tucson lighting up the internet with their joy over the white fluffy stuff. Words I used to describe it: *rainbows coming out my mouth* *hyperventillating* and *running around in circles like a dog* All of which, if not true in real life, were definitely happening to the person that inhabits my mind.

The snow this morning lasted about an hour and then it snowed again this afternoon/evening! Gigantic snowflakes! We all rushed outside and mom stuck out her tongue like a little kid! And we were squealing every time bits of it fell down the backs of our necks.

The snow is so beautiful! I couldn't help marveling at the beauty of God's design.

In addition, one wonderful thing about snow is that it makes no sound as it falls. I wrote once (I forget where) of its muffling qualities. Now I really wish I could remember where I wrote it and what I said exactly, but I believe it was something to the effect of muffling the world to sound and our hearts to pain. It's interesting because I've been thinking about sound a lot. It's become a bit of a seasonal theme for me: trying to describe the different sounds I hear everyday, or just being conscious of them. The white noise of my family puttering around the house on Saturday mornings, the crackle and hiss of wind through the grass and how similar it is to the fire that consumes it, the scrape of my skis digging into the snow. The sound of my heart when I cry out to God in my pain. And the sound of the silence. Or the sound of snow falling through the air. It is so gentle for being so icy cold.  It's amazing.