Colleen McCullough

[primrose777]

Intellectual ( responsibility) . That could be the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me
Welcome back Maud, I like the cooler weather too. In fact I am taking a trip to Orange in June. Hoping for some snow.

[Maud Fitch]

@ Gannon, Fran and Primrose.
Thank you for the nice reception, makes me feel missed and appreciated. Also, I need a dose of mild chastisement.
Or a swift kick up.....because I have been neglecting my reading. Even the Sunday newspapers were not opened.

Anyhow, as Fran prepares to walk among the Spring daffodils, we're getting ready to rug-up and go skiiing. We have to travel a fair distance to do this due to the fact that no capital city in Australia gets snow. Can you ski, Primrose? I'm good at falling down. Fran, are you adept at snow activities like tobogganing? Gannon, I bet you surf every chance you get. That's another thing I can fall down well doing.

It's Mother's Day this Sunday so if you have a Mum or are a Mum, I wish you a very happy day and breakfast in bed!
(Or breakfast in bed regardless of gender)

[Gannon]

@ Gannon, Fran and Primrose.
Thank you for the nice reception, makes me feel missed and appreciated. Also, I need a dose of mild chastisement.
Or a swift kick up.....because I have been neglecting my reading. Even the Sunday newspapers were not opened.

Anyhow, as Fran prepares to walk among the Spring daffodils, we're getting ready to rug-up and go skiiing. We have to travel a fair distance to do this due to the fact that no capital city in Australia gets snow. Can you ski, Primrose? I'm good at falling down. Fran, are you adept at snow activities like tobogganing? Gannon, I bet you surf every chance you get. That's another thing I can fall down well doing.

It's Mother's Day this Sunday so if you have a Mum or are a Mum, I wish you a very happy day and breakfast in bed!
(Or breakfast in bed regardless of gender)

Maud, I am so jealous, I have never seen snow before let alone gone skiing. It is something that I am going to have to do soon. Have a wonderful time and Break a leg.

[Maud Fitch]

Maud, I am so jealous, I have never seen snow before let alone gone skiing. It is something that I am going to have to do soon. Have a wonderful time and Break a leg.

Gannon, unfortunately it isn't me who's going skiing this year. I used the Royal "we" and actually meant Aussies generally. Primrose is the one who is heading for (hopefully) the powdery, cold, wet stuff. Lucky thing!

[DATo]

For Gannon

You awake on the morning side of midnight. You rise, and as you walk through darkened rooms on your way to get a drink of water you pass a window, and within the framed moonlight you see snowflakes drifting slowly downward like tiny, white, dancing leaves or paladin angel spirits. Hastily you dress in warm clothes not forgetting to pull on the mittens your aunt made for you last Christmas, and the heavy and cumbersome scuffed boots which have accompanied you on so many other adventures. Like a scuba diver weighted with tanks your heavy coat and boots protest movement as you make your way to the front door. You are uncomfortably warm in the insulated coat and stocking hat you have pulled down over your ears. Your hand rests for a moment on the doorknob and then you swing the door open, and like Dorothy in Oz as the door opens you behold a new and magical world.

The night greets you with an assault of cold wind upon your face as you stand in the doorway. You move forward and hear the crunch of snow as it compacts beneath your feet with each step you take. The tiny, frozen white flakes sting slightly as they brush against your face. You notice that snowflakes are accumulating on the wool of your coat at the chest and shoulders. With each exhalation your breath is a small nimbus cloud that proceeds you - a genii beckoning you forward. To your amazement you find that you can no longer distinguish where the grasses end and the concrete road begins. All are equally buried in snow to the the same level. A sea of white extends beyond your vision. The automobiles are blanketed over with thick, downy, white comforters - their windshield eyes invisible as they sleep in the quiet of the night. You look upward and see snowflakes dancing near the bright glow of the streetlight in the wind, sometimes like furious bees, and at other times like graceful ballerinas. The smell of the air is frigid-crisp, and clean. The cold night, the air, the wind, the light is silent ... silent ... silent. All is a silence of a new kind and dimension. Baron, the neighbor's dog, has heard you and he barks once to ask who is there. He sounds so far away though he is right next door. The dense snow, absorbing all sound, mutes his voice as it mutes all sound. You wander to the fence and scratch his ears as his tail wags in approval. As you turn you see your footsteps recording your walk to the fence. But even as you watch they are filling again with snow. You crouch low and take a heaping mass of snow into your hands. It is light and malleable but it is "sticking". This is the best kind of snow. Unlike powder snow you know this kind will compact into form. Already you picture the snowman on your front yard in the morning when the kids have had their fun.

It is time to go back inside, but for a moment you savor your aloneness with the night ... and the visiting snow. A backward glance at Baron who is attempting to catch snowflakes with his teeth makes you smile. You hold back your head and stick your tongue out as you did when you were a child and let the cold, cold snowflakes drop upon your tongue. You retrace your steps to the front door and go inside not forgetting to kick your boots against the concrete step to knock off the snow. Once inside and shed of coats, and hats, and boots you stand in the darkness at the window once again and watch the snowflakes fall.

[primrose777]

@ Gannon, Fran and Primrose.
Thank you for the nice reception, makes me feel missed and appreciated. Also, I need a dose of mild chastisement.
Or a swift kick up.....because I have been neglecting my reading. Even the Sunday newspapers were not opened.

Anyhow, as Fran prepares to walk among the Spring daffodils, we're getting ready to rug-up and go skiiing. We have to travel a fair distance to do this due to the fact that no capital city in Australia gets snow. Can you ski, Primrose? I'm good at falling down. Fran, are you adept at snow activities like tobogganing? Gannon, I bet you surf every chance you get. That's another thing I can fall down well doing

It's Mother's Day this Sunday so if you have a Mum or are a Mum, I wish you a very happy day and breakfast in bed!
(Or breakfast in bed regardless of gender)

@ Maud, yes I can ski, though probably not very well. I spent a ski season in France and that was where I learnt. Great fun but wet and cold when you fall down which I did often at the start.I had never seen snow before then. Orange has snow but not enough to ski on but plenty to make snowmen and throw snowballs at people. I will be visiting friends.
I will indeed have a happy Mothers day, breakfast in bed is always interesting

[DATo]

OH YES !!!! HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY IN ADVANCE TO ALL MOTHERS ON THIS BOARD !!!
(Thank your primrose for reminding me)

May you all receive a lot of books as gifts, and may they all be exchangeable *L*

EDIT: Make that "Thank YOU primrose for reminding me."

[Fran]

@DATo
Liked you elegy to the snow but if I never see snow again it will be too soon. It's OK when you're a child but the pristine whiteness & the silence is not worth the disruption IMO.
Give me the sun any day

[DATo]

@DATo
Liked you elegy to the snow but if I never see snow again it will be too soon. It's OK when you're a child but the pristine whiteness & the silence is not worth the disruption IMO. :(
Give me the sun any day :lol:

I do agree. Gannon's enthusiasm should be tempered by the slogan - "Be careful what you wish for: it might come true." *LOL*

[Gannon]

@DATo
Liked you elegy to the snow but if I never see snow again it will be too soon. It's OK when you're a child but the pristine whiteness & the silence is not worth the disruption IMO.
Give me the sun any day

I do agree. Gannon's enthusiasm should be tempered by the slogan - "Be careful what you wish for: it might come true." *LOL*

Thanks DATo for the amazing elegy. Brilliantly descriptive writing which made me feel like I was there (the power of the written word and imagination). I know what you and Fran mean about too much of a good thing. I go to the beach everyday and yet there are millions of people on this planet who have never seen the ocean. I really want to see snow however.

@Maud

If you are not going skiing Maud then do not break a leg whatever you do.

[Fran]

@Gannon
What's stopping you .... sure you're only a short hop from the Antartic & I'm told by a penguin I know that there is loads of the white stuff there

[primrose777]

@ everyone, from the land of ocean, surf and sand ( I also live by the beach), I only have a romanticized view of the snow. Especially at christmas. There are many of us here in Australia who would love a white chritmas just like in the movies The thought of snow being disruptive and inconvienient incomprehesible.However we do see every year news footage of blizzards in Europe and the USA and I marvel how thick that snow is. Friends of mine in Canada regularly have snow almost covering their windows. I dont even wear a coat where I live in Winter, maybe a jumper.

@ DATo, I would settle for a book voucher, then I can go shopping

[Gannon]

@Gannon
What's stopping you .... sure you're only a short hop from the Antartic & I'm told by a penguin I know that there is loads of the white stuff there

See Fran that's how out of touch with the snowy regions of our planet I am. I did not even realise that penguins could talk.

[Maud Fitch]

@Gannon
What's stopping you .... sure you're only a short hop from the Antartic & I'm told by a penguin I know that there is loads of the white stuff there

See Fran that's how out of touch with the snowy regions of our planet I am. I did not even realise that penguins could talk.

Gannon, they can DANCE too.

[Gannon]

@Gannon
What's stopping you .... sure you're only a short hop from the Antartic & I'm told by a penguin I know that there is loads of the white stuff there

See Fran that's how out of touch with the snowy regions of our planet I am. I did not even realise that penguins could talk.

Gannon, they can DANCE too.

WHAT?? They dance as well.