Or, anyway, from the portion of my neighborhood, beyond which I dared not travel. These photos were taken several hours after the onslaught of snow finally ceased. Some people were able to dig their cars out from underneath iced-over slabs of snow. Others weren't so lucky.
The thing about this snowstorm was not its magnitude
per se, but rather its severity. Huge amounts of precipitation and wickedly strong wind gusts were concentrated within a disconcertingly brief span of time. As a result, the school day was canceled in both the private and public schools across the city. This might not seem so out of the ordinary, but apparently,
today was Chicago Public Schools' first declared 'snow day' in 12 years(!).
It's said that this long streak of eschewing weather-induced school cancellations has been a point of pride among CPS officials, which is actually admirable considering the fact that so many poor children depend upon the schools for vital services that are frequently unavailable to them at home (including breakfast and lunch). But road conditions have continued to be so bad today that it would have been genuinely irresponsible for the administrators not to have called off school. They've also called off school for tomorrow, February 3rd, which is also more than merely the prudent option.
If you want to know how dangerous the roads still are in this city, consider that Lake Shore Drive—Chicago's bustling thoroughfare that races alongside the coast of Lake Michigan—had to be
closed to traffic yesterday and, as I type, has
not yet been reopened(!). Not only that, but apparently, there are still hundreds of abandoned cars stuck in the snow in the middle of this four-to-six-lane highway.
Nothing to do on a day like this except take photographs. And post them on one's normally horribly neglected blog. And tomorrow's going to be more of the same.
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3 comments:
Yike! A true winter wonderland, in a weird way your pics kinda make me jealous as we're living through a near snowless winter here in north-western Poland. Too bad we can't find an explanation for the bizarre weather patterns we're seeing around the world!
...in a weird way your pics kinda make me jealous as we're living through a near snowless winter here in north-western Poland....
Well, then again, you get to be in Poland, which, in general is much more interesting than being stuck in the American Midwest! But I know what you mean. The snow creates a kind of beautiful panorama. Especially before it has time to get dirty and gross.
And it's definitely true—and I think the snapshots I posted probably capture this to some extent—that there is something about 'snow days' that creates a particular kind of 'carnivalesque' atmosphere. It's a feeling of things being out of the ordinary, a suspension of normality that creates a heightened sense of community and/or neighborliness.
Added to that is the way in which the phenomenon of the 'snow day' triggers fond memories from childhood.
Is that snow inside of a tunnel? How did that happen? How many days did you get off from work? Nice pics man.
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