In July 1983, my young family and I moved to the Denver area from Southern California. We were actually looking forward to our first winter – wondering what it would be like to “live in snow”. That first Thanksgiving in Colorado we found out, as we experienced not only our first snow storm, but also our first blizzard.
And what a blizzard it was, with about 2 FEET of snow falling in 36 hours or so. For a family from sunny California, it was an eye opening experience, to say the least.
At first, my daughter, wife, and I were delighted by the early arrival of winter. We had never seen anything so beautiful and, for those of you who’ve never experienced it, the SILENCE that accompanies a heavy snowfall is also a beautiful thing. Eventually though, it just became TOO much, and trying to move around town for the next couple of weeks was incredibly difficult.
The entire metro Denver area shut down for days. We pretty much stayed inside and watched movies on the VCR, after trudging through the snow to rent them. (Remember renting movies on VHS tape?) We must have watched a dozen rented movies over that long weekend. And, of course, we also learned about shoveling snow and scraping windshields.
The snow was so heavy that weekend that we actually had remnants of it still on the ground when June rolled around.
Today of course, with the passage and blurring of time, it’s a fond memory of our first “wintry” experience together as a family, one that makes me smile and think “I remember how close it made us feel.”
That was quite a Thanksgiving, believe me.
This year, I hope your family creates a fond memory for you to share some day. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
Richard's Ride 