Hi my dear forum friends!
It's snowing outside again today. When the snowflakes fall I'm always happy whether inside admiring it, or outside in the peaceful splendour. I've told you a lot about that before so I won't talk about the same things to do with the glories of snow. Some of you know them first-hand, because you live where the snow falls, and some of you live where it's hot, and can only imagine. Well, snow has a lot to do with Canada, as I'm sure you know. There is nobody here who hasn't experienced snow, although Vancouver Island has been called Canada's Mediterranean, it still gets snow from time to time.
My daughter in Vancouver told me that there are plum blossoms in bloom. They've had some snow there recently and they are so unused to it that they usually have lots of car accidents. They don't know how to change their driving for snow, and their cars don't have the right tires, either. My daughter in Victoria also wishes for snow, but is getting rain now instead. They had snow, but as they are on Vancouver Island it was a rarity.
The news has been full of reports of avalanches. People go up into the mountains in the back country. They take snow boards or skis, or snow mobiles. When the weather is as it is now ,avalanches are a danger if you disturb the snow pack. Thousands of tons of snow can begin to slide, roaring down the mountain, pushing air before them to create a wind, even breaking down trees as it roars down with the people who have caused it. The weather is beautiful, the scenery heavenly, the air pure and cold, and they feel like eagles as they soar and swoop over the virgin snow on their snowboards or skis -- or even their noisy, smelly snow mobiles. When the weather isn't as pleasant, with lots of snow falling is often most dangerous time, but those people don't want to be out then. The snow may make strange noises and show signs of shifting and rolling but no one is there to be buried, because it isn't pleasant enough.
But when the weather looks beautiful, and there has been a bit of a thaw and then lots of new powder snow fell, that is when they make dangerous mis-judgements, and so then we have avalanche deaths. And there have been lots lately. People are advised not to go off the safe snow ski runs that have been tested, but they often just can't resist the lure of skiing in pristine, newly fallen powder snow -- considered to be the best. As the mountain begins to send its huge, wide swath of snow down under them without any warning sounds, they are supposed to try to keep an air pocket in front of their faces by holding their arms and hands up in case they are buried. They are also supposed to back stroke as though in water, to try to stay on top. They carry electronic instruments that emit beeps if they are buried. That's how they can be found.
Yesterday I heard about three young men who could have died. One was buried deeply and upside down, wrapped around a tree. His friends had escaped up a strong tree to the side. Then they had to try to find him by the beeping noise. Finally they heard it and dug down where they found his boot sticking up. They had to go much further down and he wasn't breathing. His lips were swollen, his face blue. They thought he was dead, but began to try to clearsnow away from the trunk of his body, and he began to breathe and groan. He spent the night in hospital and intends to do the same kind of thing again. To ski off into virgin snow in the back-country. Some say they get a tremendous feeling of "high" from it.
Seven students, fourteen years old, were all killed last year the same way, on a school trip. There are always more deaths in the cold beauty. Are you a dare-devil like that? I'm not. I tend to think of my safety, and avoid "clear and present danger."
Uncle Ben came home now. It's 4:40 in the afternoon and he found me writing here, so he brought me a plate of cut apples, and a cup of Strawberry tea with a little milk in it.
Panpanpan said that he was going to try tea with milk, like I drink it, but I don't think he'll like it. The tea we take with milk is Orange Pecoe black tea, not green Chinese tea. The one I especially like has strawberry flavour added.
I'll tell you about "Snow Angels" in my next post.
Affectionately, Mary
