Paris turned bitterly cold last week. One would think that after 4 years at Hilllsdale, in the arctic tundra of Michigan, I would be totally adapted to cold. Even though I know that Hillsdale was much, much colder than Paris, it doesn’t feel that way. In the country, you deal with the cold in quick bursts, in running from car to shelter, or from building to building. You get to watch winter from inside. Cold in a city, on the other hand, proves a much greater inconvenience. I spend much more time outside walking between places, resulting in forever frozen appendages, which quickly turn uncomfortably hot in the metro, then re-freeze to an even more painful state outside.
What was Wednesday a cruel cold without recompense, with a sun and perfect blue sky mocking the frozen fountains, transitioned yesterday morning to a snowy cold, swirling flakes over my head. I love first snows, I love that excitement of seeing white slowly descend. I like seeing the faded nature replaced by dusty white and I love how excited the kids at school were to watch snow falling past the window. Even at Hillsdale where I never had to worry about not getting another snow, the first one was magical. Yesterday was the type of day fitting for the weeks leading up to Christmas. It makes me feel like Christmas is really here, which makes me eager to hop on a plane tomorrow morning and head for home. Last night the little girls I babysit and I made a snowman (a whopping 18 inch tall one with chic leaf pigtails) and caught snowflakes on our tongues. I turned up my Christmas music and settled into my cozy apartment high about Paris’ frosted roofs.
This morning I waded through slush to the train station, trudged through dirty snow to work, and attempted to engage kids who had already left on vacation in terms of their academic attitudes. When attempting to catch a bus to my afternoon school, I learned my bus line was no longer running due to inclement weather, aka the several centimeters of snow that had since melted. This same light dusting grounded most flights in and out of Paris, making me fear for my own tomorrow. By the time I walked the 45 minutes in the snow to my second school, I was perhaps slightly less positive in my First Snow Attitude. Yet now that I am toasty (or slowly becoming such) in my little apartment with my space heater running full force, I am reclaiming my perspective. After all, I am packing to go home for Christmas, and nothing brings more warmth than that.
2000 Streets 
This blog post is like everything I’m thinking! I, too, was thinking the same thing the other day about how even though the winters in the Midwest are much colder, we’re spoiled–going from building to car to home is not as bad as walking around in a big city. And the metros are deceiving! Here, let me warm up your feet just above freezing only to HA HA! subject you to even more cold that will make you wish you hadn’t even tasted my warmness! And, also very strangely, my buses were canceled too! Argh 45-minute walks with aforementioned freezing cold weather make me wish I had my little Honda Accord back..