Snow and mountains
I landed on Hartford, Connecticut, in early December. I had come in from Washington D.C. There was a family waiting for me there: Kate and Dick, the parents, and their girls, Jenny, Teresa, Mary and Missy. As soon as we left the gate and went to look for the car, Jenny ran like crazy and came back holding a ball, and showing a big smile. She threw it at me. It was cold, and white. That was the first time I saw snow. I was 16 then. There was nothing more fascinating than that one hour ride to Northampton, as I looked to frozen creeks and bare trees, and pines all covered in white. One night, there was a blizzard, and I stayed glued by the window. Kate wrote a letter to my mom and told her how I mentioned that the snowflakes seemed to be dancing. (Later, my dad told me that my mother cried).
Years later, I was in Europe. I spent a few weeks in Spain. It was winter and I missed something. "I want to see snow", I decided. I took a night train and crossed France and got to Switzerland (in the calendar pictures it always looks white). I ended up in a village called Interlaken. One day, I took a train up the hills. And that was the first time I saw real mountains. There was white everywhere, little chalets brown as chocolate, winding roads to walk by, the view of the valley, an ocean of peaks like I had seen only in photographs.
Where I live, snow and mountains are non existent articles. We have rounded hills covered with woods, picturesque coves and lakes. I feel the marine breeze everyday, that salty, fishy smell, which feels like being home. But I can't remember for the life of me of the first time that I saw the sea.
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