One of my sisters moved from Arkansas to Canada in the 1980s, and I recall being astounded by tales of winter weather in the North, particularly that schools never canceled and that children still went outside for recess. We in Arkansas, on the other hand, built snow days into the annual calendar!
That was forty years ago, and I have lived in Wisconsin long enough now to hear from all sides that winters were far worse then. But I have not lived in Wisconsin long enough to know very much, so I watched with interest when the forecast for yesterday featured wind chill lows in the negative thirties, numbers that had not been experienced here in several years. Our workplace chose not to cancel classes in spite of the forecast; however, in response to an idea proposed by the student government, we did assemble several faculty and staff members to drive students between upper and lower campus throughout the day. So I spent the first few hours of my Friday driving my SUV and offering rides. I loved it.
Many students turned me down, I assume by some because they weren’t intimidated by the bitter cold, others possibly because they found it as creepy as it felt for me for an old dude to lower his window and offer a ride! But many said yes and were grateful and fun, and it was great spending unanticipated time with such wonderful students.
My favorite story may have been Rocco, a fantastic young man who is student teaching this semester. I saw him bundled up and walking alone on the far side of a set of residence halls, and he jumped at the offer of a ride even though he was only headed to the other side of the set of residence halls. It didn’t take long to drive to his front door, and I joked that I could keep driving in circles if he wanted to warm up more. He instantly took me up on the offer, so I drove slowly in circles and got caught up on his student teaching this semester and shared stories of mine from forever ago.
What an unexpected gift.
This brought back a specific set of Mississippi memories.
The Mississippi Gulf Coast sees a lot of rain. Not steady, Seattle rain. Occasional, torrential downpours. I was asked to lead a church on the Mississippi Gulf Coast at the turn of the century and had the honor of doing so for a decade. Our church’s building had an awning on its back side, but at the time that area was used for storage and inaccessible by car. So on stormy Sunday mornings, churchgoers were simply going to get wet. I don’t remember who suggested it, probably my hero, Gene, but someone suggested that we purchase a nice set of golf umbrellas for those bad weather days. I have such lovely memories of gloomy, yucky days out in the driving rain with good people like Gene, Herman, and Joel, standing at the car door of elderly widows or families with children, joking and laughing as we escorted them into the safety of the building.
I do not like driving rain, and I know that spending those precious minutes before conducting a worship service in the driving rain with an umbrella is not recommended. But I know that somehow, miraculously, those turned out to be my favorite Sundays.
All this has me thinking today as an actual winter storm sweeps across the nation and all sorts of metaphorical storms terrorize our world: When rough weather arrives in your neighborhood, whether literally or otherwise, I suggest that you lean into it and look around for how to give someone a hand. It might not affect the weather, but in my experience it has produced unexpected smiles along with a special and unforgettable feeling that is beyond my capacity to describe
Starting to Look Up 