Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Here Comes the Sun (do do do do)

As I have noted in my earlier blogs, the weather here has been positively bizarre. Although the first few days saw sun and warm temperatures, the rest since then have been cold, dreary, and rainy. I had not seen the sun in nearly two weeks, and I we had all grown quite tired of having damp clothing at day's end.

Last night, though, we left our nightly movie watching ritual (in a stadium seating lecture hall) to see our campus under a blanket of white, fluffy snow! It had been cold, but we did not expect to see snow at all, much less the 2+ inches that had fallen in the previous hour and a half. We played in it for a few hours, building the requisite snowman and having very sophisticated snowball fights; by that I mean the campus is full of retaining walls, barriers, hidden corners and such, making a simple snowball fight into a strategic exercise. It was a pleasant and unexpected surprise that made up for the previous weeks of undesirable weather.

Although 90% of the snow had melted by this morning, the sun finally did show its face from behind the clouds for nearly an hour. It kissed our pale faces for that brief moment, and although it went away shortly thereafter, its mere existence seemed to...well, brighten our day (no pun intended). I am reminded of the Ray Bradbury short story "All Summer in a Day." It is about a group of people living on a planet that only gets sun once every seven years; you never realize how much you appreciate the sun until you don't see it for a long time!

1 comment:

  1. I thought Cairo was strange, because some days I'm cold and some days I wish I could peel off layers. Wind chill is a back factor here.
    But I guess I have a better idea than you! Sounds like the good-old Atlantic seaboard. Remind you of home a bit, mayhaps.
    Keep having fun and keep in touch!

    ReplyDelete