Winter in August

Summer has finally kicked in in earnest here in Washington, but today I’m thinking about a moment in time deep in the middle of a Cleveland winter in my very early childhood. We had recently moved to 3326. Although I don’t remember the year, or exactly how old I was, it must have been sometime during the winter spanning 1956/57. The snow was heavy on the ground, and it was after dark. Our family had a sled with a removable upright back and sides, so that small children could sit supported in the sled and be pulled with the long loop of rope that was affixed to the sled’s front. The younger of my two younger siblings, both brothers, had not yet been born or was too young to participate, and so it came to pass on this particular snowy evening that my parents piled my sister (the oldest, and heading up the back of the sled), me (in the middle, acting out in real time and space the role of middle child), and then my brother (in front of me, smaller and nestled against the front of my puffy gray and navy snowsuit) into the sled for a ride around the neighborhood.

It was cold and dark, but only as dark as it can be with the ground completely white and streetlamps shining their light on the soft sparkly snow. My father, wearing a formal man’s overcoat, thick leather gloves and no hat, pulled the sled out into the driveway and down the apron to the street. I marveled at how big and strong he was—it seemed unfathomable that he could pull a sled with three people in it. He was my father. He was big and strong and capable. He would take care of me as I felt my sister hug me and as I hugged my brother, snugly tucked into our warm clothes and the safety of the guard-railed sled. The world was cold and icy, but a place of wonder nonetheless. The street was quiet, and there were no cars on the road this evening—the snow must have been so heavy that day that it drove everyone inside and kept them there. My father pulled the sled into the street, where passing cars had earlier packed the snow into slicker, smoother, and icier tracks on which to pull the sled. Keep your hands inside, kids, he said, we’re going for a ride! He began to run, pulling the sled behind him. He seemed very far away, since he was so tall and far from the ground, compared to my small huddled nearness to all that snow and ice, close enough to touch if I had not heeded my father’s warning to keep my hands tucked in and safe. The windows in the houses we passed on either side of the street glowed from within. Whatever sounds there might have been in the larger world were muffled, as they are in a heavy snow, and all I heard was the smooth sound of our sled runners moving over the packed snow and my father’s crunchy steps as he ran. He would slow to a brisk walk from time to time, both to catch his breath and to see how we were faring in our sled. I could see his breath escaping in cloudy puffs as he looked back at us. Before long, he’d run again. He pulled us all around the block, running most of the way to make sure we had the most fun possible. I hoped it would never end.

I have not made a list of the happiest moments of my life—I’m not the kind of person who makes lists like that, and I would hate to rank those moments. Nevertheless, even though I was no more than four years old when it happened, that ride around the block is right up there with the top ten.