First Snow Lives On.

My husband read my passage on First Snow yesterday, and he asked a lot of questions:

• "Did you get this ritual from somewhere?"  I believe I invented it in December of 1984. There are friends of mine who now have their own rituals. Sometimes they post on Facebook and tell me they miss me. I miss them too.
• "Do you celebrate it every year?" I've missed a lot of years. One time I was in the hospital and missed it. Some years we don't get snow in November and December, and it seems too late if the first snow happens in February. 
• "What are the rules?" Funny you should ask:
• There has to be enough snow expected to cover the grass outside -- at least one inch.
• You need one person minimum, and there's no set maximum.  However, as you can't plan ahead of time, the number of participants is limited by who's available. It's harder to have guests as you get older or live in a small town.
• You can either sit in the snow and cold, or bring a bowl of snow inside. 
• Participant(s) will toast with a beverage associated with wintertime. This includes, but is not limited to, eggnog, hot mulled cider, mulled wine, wassail, brandy, or blackberry brandy.  Regardless of how many participants, there's only one cup.You can fill the mug more than once.  It's a ritual; we don't care about germs.
• The cup is passed around in a circle. Each participant takes a sip of it and proposes a toast. The first toast is always "To the snow". The last toast is usually very silly, as all the important things have been toasted to earlier. They get sillier more quickly if the mug contains an alcohol-based fortifying beverage.
• The toasting ends when all the beverage is gone or all have run out of ideas for toasts. Or frozen to death.

Over the years, I've collected stories around First Snow. There was the year (ah! my college days!) when three of us decided to sit on the Old Stone Bridge in Champaign, a small arch over a creek, toasting the First Snow with a mug of blackberry brandy, swathed in an old sleeping bag -- and in violation of park rules twice over, with the alcohol and the lateness of the hour. And then the cop showed up. I piped up and told him we were celebrating the first snow and this was hot cider. I babbled out the whole ritual to him. The cop looked down, likely incredulous, and instructed us to finish quickly. It makes me sad to think that if we had not been white college students, it could have ended badly.

The best toast ever was made by Jon Jay Obermark, on a balcony that bravely held eight people and a mug of cheap brandy (E&J, what else?). "To that star up there ... and that star there ... and that star over there!"

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It turns out there will be a snow tonight in Maryville. A first snow for the season. 

Richard and I will bring in a bowl of snow as the honored guest, and drink a mug of Irish coffee, my only alcohol for the year. Outside, darkness will press on the windows, and in the First Snow ritual, we will find the light in fellowship. The first toast we will drink will be to the snow; the second, to the people from our past and present, scattered all over the world.

"Through the years, we all will be together, 

if the fates allow ... "