and suddenly, it’s like we’re kids again.

today was a wonderful day to be in Minnesota. all day long i looked out the window of my 27th floor office (okay, glorified cubicle) and watched delicate ivory snowflakes flutter past. mother nature was awesome in her delivery of 5 fresh inches of white power.

sure, there was no shortage of frustrations. buses running late or not showing up at all, jack knifed semis and t-boned SUVs and Corollas in ditches… but when i finally climbed in my icebox of a truck and started to make my way toward my son’s school, i couldn’t resist turning off my traction control and whippin’ a shitty in the lot of my park and ride.

after the boy was safely buckled in the back seat (and the traction control was turned back on), i SPAM-texted a few friend while stopped at a traffic light. just a simple “did you make it home safe?” yeses came tucked inside the little blue envelopes on my cell phone screen. all seemed well… that is until one of those little blue envelopes delivered the message I had hoped NOT to hear. “I just t-boned J’s new van.” came the reply from E, my landlord. shortly thereafter, a similar message from J, his roommate. both live upstairs from me and are great friends of mine. ug. no good.

so, i texted them both back to make sure they weren’t bleeding profusely or waiting for the jaws of life to arrive which, thankfully, they were not. all the way home i worried about them. when i pulled up in front of the house, there sat J’s van, resting peacefully in front of the house under a thick blanket of new fallen snow.

when i ventured to the back yard to allow them to laugh at me properly, i found them bundled up in full winter gear shoveling and running the snowblower. i stood at the door and watched them, confused by their odd method of clearance. as i watched, they blew all the snow in the yard into one corner with the precision of a surgeon. one would run the blower and the other would use the shovel to push stray piles into the path of the churning claws. in thick streams the powder shot toward the corner and when the alley light caught it, it glimmered like fairy dust.

eventually i grew bored of watching them and returned to the house for a hot shower. when i stepped out, steaming and refreshed, my son knocked on the door.

“mom, mom! you have to come look at this!”

i slipped on my robe, wrapped my hair in a towel and followed him over the squeaky hardwood floors to his bedroom.

“what?” i asked.

he pulled up his blinds and pointed out the window to the back yard.

“look” he said.

the “boys”, J and E, had taken all that carefully placed snow and made a giant slide from the top of the fort, which stands about 4 feet in the air, down to the ground. as i looked out with my son, they turned toward us and just stood grinning. they looked as though they were saying, “look mom! we made a slide!”

: )

and though they aren’t mine (wouldn’t THAT be something if I had a 29 and 28 year old?), i was very proud of what those two big kids had done. clearly, so were they.