Well, after one of the mildest winters I can recall, we are now at the tail end of what our local news-radio meterologist has declared the “second greatest snowstorm in the city’s history”. The greatest was the blizzard of December 26-27th, 1947, which deposited 26.4 inches. The records, of course, only go back so far; if we were to include the Pleistocene, a snow-cover of 26.4 inches would probably fall short of the all-time record by several thousand feet. But such quibbles aside, this is a pretty impressive snowfall. As of ten this morning, the accumulation in Central Park was up to 22.8 inches, and it’s still snowing hard. Here’s a peek out of my back window, taken at about 2 o’clock:
I’ve always loved dramatic weather, and blizzards are my favorite of all. I’m sure some of this is due to boyhood excitement at the prospect of a day off from school, but I’ve shed many of my other childhood enthusiasms – such as orange soda and Tom Swift books – without any noticeable abatement of my fondness for snowstorms. Of course, here in Gotham we can enjoy all the positive aspects of a blizzard – the muffling of the city’s din, the softening of its angular contours by a wind-sculpted mantle of white, the spontaneous grins and greetings exchanged by down-swaddled pedestrians – without having to put up with any of the inconveniences borne by our ancestors, like having to eat one another.