I knew it couldn’t last forever, this mild winter we were experiencing. Now we’re covered in snow, just like we’re meant to be. Wintery white, cold, crisp and sparkly. How lovely.
About six inches of lovely is covering my driveway. This has to be shoveled, the walks need to be cleared and the cars need to be dug out, and Peter's back is sore. Ugh. Winter. I’m so over it.
The burst of cold air hits me when I bring Chip chip out for his morning walk. I don't want to trudge through the snow, so I let him run, leash free. Chances are he wouldn't come back if he didn't have brakfast as enticement. But after he lets the night go in the trees, he runs out to bounce in the snow with the joy of the five-year-old puppy he is. He rolls and jumps, sending explosions of pristine white snow into glittering clouds around him.
I guess that's how you greet winter when you’re happy about it. I shiver and pull my coat closer around my neck.
Then there’s Wick, our eight-month-old kitten. She stops short when the door opens, as if to say ‘Whoa, who changed my world, and what did they paint it with?” I give her a bit of encouragement with my Sorel booted foot.
Wick bounces off the steps and is suddenly steps cat-knee deep in snow. She looks at me. Her look is clearly confused until a random brown leaf scurries across the white landscape, and Wick, true to her form, attacks it with one leap, landing her furry little butt neck deep in snow. She freezes.
This is how you greet winter if you just don’t know what’s going on. Crawl in a hole and wait it out.
I trudge on through, grabbing the newspaper, watching the animals. I’m not sure what Wick is doing, but she has yet to move from her snow-fox hole. Chip is still doing his business back in the bush, if the white puffs of flying snow are any indication.
When I start hollering 'breakfast' into the woods, my breath puffing out in cold clouds, Wick braves her way out of her hole and bounds back towards the door, where her snow-less life waits for her.
I have to call the dog a couple of times and remind him that breakfast is waiting, but all he wants to do is roll in the snow. Weirdo. At last it registers. I can almost see his drool freezing as it hangs from his chin. He heads back toward the house at a dead run. Uh oh.
Wick has almost made it, has only one little jump left to make it, but Chip sees her first.
Let's just say that after the cloud of snow clears, only Wick's ear is visible. When she emerges from the snow, she is not happy. She swipes nastily at the tail-wagging dog. He jumps away from her and bounds into the house, obviously proud of himself for besting the cat (for once).
Wick shakes her fur free of the offending snow and cautiously follows me into the house, looking for her attacker. There is heat and revenge in her eyes. I wisely keep my bare hands away from her. Her tail swipes in greedy, angry arcs as she creeps down the back stairs. She knows she's got time.
Chip can't think of anything but the word 'breakfast'.
Once the dog is fed and greedily munching away, I watch as Wick casually makes her way to Chip’s big bed. I see it in her eyes as she looks at the dog, who is completely oblivious to what's about to happen.
I sense it only two seconds too late. Wick hops in Chip's sacred place, walks right to the middle and promptly squats to do her wet business right where the dog sleeps.
I start to yell at her and tell her ‘bad cat!’, but then it hits me. Even through the laughter bubbling up and tumbling out of me, I realize I have more laundry to do, but more importantly,
Wick has showed Chip what she thinks of him trouncing her in the snow.
And really, who can blame her? Sometimes snow just sucks.
