Friday, December 12, 2008

Frozen world


price freeze, originally uploaded by toyfoto.

Woke up this morning to the sound of ice sliding off the metal roof.

"WHAT! was THAT!?," asked Annabel, who had taken advantage of her father's travels to sleep in our bed.

"Ice sliding off the roof," I answered matter-of-factly.

It was cold, the heat hadn't kicked on. Silas was still in a warm little heap between us.

I checked the clock. It was dark and empty.

No power.

Nothing to do but dress and leave; maybe there'd be electricity at the babysitter's house. I phoned. Nope. But she's got a fireplace and a gas stove, so there's heat.

Our ghosts -- the ones we'd hung from our two mighty black walnut trees but didn't take down after halloween -- had fallen to the lawn with dozens of tree limbs.

The firetruck had blocked the road so I decided to turn right and see the rest of the neighborhood. Trees and limbs downed everywhere.

"What kind of world is this?" exclaimed Annabel from the backseat. And then she was silent. The whole car was silent for a moment until she answered her own question.

"It looks like a beautiful FROZEN world."

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I know icestorms can be deadly, and they're inconvenient, and they suck for a lot of reasons; but there are few things more beautiful than the world after an icestorm. It's like the whole world is made of fairy candy.

Just thinking about that, I remember clearly what every tree out our Cambridge window looked like after my one New England icestorm, but I had totally forgotten falling on said ice, gashing my knee to the bone, and needing 27 really painful stitches and a full leg immobilizer all winter. That's how gorgeous ice storms are.

kimmyk said...

quite a beautiful world indeed miss Annabel.

Binky said...

Ha! She's more optimistic than I am. I'm not a fan of the big freeze. But the first one of the season is usually quite arresting.

mamatulip said...

A beautiful frozen world...I love that.

Love the first picture - it says so much, yet is so simple.

Anonymous said...

Okay, but seriously? I'm in Terryville and we didn't have ANY ice. At all. It's like we're living in two different states! Come stay with us. What's two more adults and two kids added on to a house with three dogs. Hey, doesn't sound like utopia, but we've got cable at least. :)