I had my own pair of ice skates growing up....because a couple of years the pond behind our house froze solid. It wasn't like living in the Northeast, but we got many good snowfalls a year. Lots of opportunity for sledding. Snowball fights. Snow shelters (which is what we called them after we realized building an actual igloo required more knowledge/skill/time than we had). Snowmen.

Now, I realize I have to make sacrifices for living south of the Mason-Dixon, and for the most part I love it. That's why Knoxville was voted the #1 place to retire. I made that up. For the benefit of my parents.:) But seriously, the weather is great and I could live with no-snow. I get to visit it in Indiana. What I can't live with is the 'promise of snow'. So, from this moment forward, I am never listening to another East TN weatherman, in his faux-Haiwian-print-shirt-under-a-suit and excessively bushy hair, EVER! (I have said this before, but I mean it now).

The recap of this week, if you don't live here, goes something like this: people start buzzing about snow on tues, on weds local retailers are advertising sleds, and by thurs the pharmacy is calling me "mrs. burch, please come and pick up Lilah's medicine because we don't want her to be without if we have to be closed for a few days." At this point, I start to take it a little seriously. Not getting excited, just making sure we have milk and meat (even though I'm pretty sure a family of 4 could live for a month on the contents of my pantry) and the appropriate medicines. Thurs night, I decide to turn on the news because, apparently they aren't going to interrupt the Backyardigans for a weather report, as I had been hoping. "6-12 inches." My ears perk up. I have been trained over the past years to know better ( I cannot count the number of snow-disappointments at this point). But I get sucked into the excitement.

Friday morning I learn schools have been called off. This must be something, I think. Even though I have yet to see a snowflake fall, I rush off to Target with both kids and everyone else in Knoxville for new boots and a sled. (I start therapy Monday). I count 3 snow pellets on my windshield on the way and start to dream of the possibilities. I talk it up to Garrett, who is already planning his sledding wardrobe. On the radio, they are giving snow cream recipes and advising people to stay off the roads. Everyone I know is talking about the blizzard of 2010. Even the biggest snow cynics are starting to get the fever. Plans for neighborhood snow parties are put in place. I hear groceries are out of bread, milk, and beans. I dig through cedar chests to find snow pants and waterproof gloves. This is it! How exciting!!!!

Just for the record the forcast was: 6-12 inches of snow, interspersed with ice (best sledding!), and rapidly dropping temps the next day. You know what we got? Maybe 1.5 inches of the sorriest snow I've ever seen. I knew it was a bad sign when the sound of rain woke me up this morning. Seriously!?! I thought we could count on at least a couple of good sleds down the hill (in a rubbermaid storage bin posing as a sled. clearly the best time to buy a sled is not in the south, on the day of an expected blizzard:), but, it's really hard to sled in the rain. I'm pretty sure I passed a goldfish on my way to get the paper from our mailbox.

I am sad. Mad. Very disappointed. And, I have to say, a bit disappointed in my own immaturity to get so worked up over a little (or practically no) snow. Garrett just said, "momma, has it quit raining so we can go outside in the snow?". I think there is a life lesson in here somewhere.