Snow geese are white-bodied geese with black wing tips and tail feathers barely visible on the ground, but noticeable in flight. Usually they are more often heard before they are seen with a shrill cacophony of honking much higher up and with more rapid wing beats than their Canada cousins.

They do not like to travel without the company of another dozen or so geese and can form flocks of hundreds up to a thousand or more, already sighted in spring migration over Pennsylvania and headed this way north toward their Canada coastal breeding grounds. If lucky enough to watch one of these flights swirl down from the sky, it has been described as like standing in a snow globe as they blanket the ground in the flurry of a sudden blizzard.

Snow geese are closely related to the blue goose species in a morph controlled by a single gene. White starts to become blue in one subsequent generation, as opposed to the seasonal adaptation of camouflaging with rotating weather conditions, creating variables much like the northern partridge-like ptarmigan, the ermine weasel, and arctic fox. Native Americans were more deeply aware of environmental phenomena and read into them spiritual meaning, such as the appearance of one white buffalo once every hundred years or so – not an albino pigment deficiency, but a genetic roll of the dice, and a sacred omen of good fortune for the immediate future from past experience in their history.

How lucky is it for you and I to look skyward when the chilled stillness of the pale blue Buzzards Bay sky of late winter is broken by the shrill clarion of a lofty flock of snow geese, raising our hopes for an early spring, a heavenly orchestration as thrilling as the dramatic Hallelujah chorus of Handel’s immortal Messiah masterpiece. My subsequent message of a forecast for snow geese has a double meaning as a wish with you for an optimistic sun sign just over the horizon.

By George B. Emmons

Here I sit on Sunday digesting my egg and avocado on toast along with the news, including this latest forecast calling for another blizzard on Tuesday – Tuesday, AKA deadline day for us in the weekly newspaper business.

With the impending snow comes a winter storm warning whirlwind of uncertainty – how much snow will we get, do we have enough toilet paper and wine, will my Tuesday meetings be canceled leaving me short two stories, do we have enough wine, did I put the snow shovel back where it belongs, do we have enough wine, and can I endure another snow day and still be sane by bedtime?

Normally I’m ambivalent about snow days. On the one hand, with school canceled, there is no mad rush to get up another ten minutes late to throw together the same school lunch as every day, make sure the kid has his shirt on right, matching socks (on second thought, as long as he’s got two socks we’re good), a thorough tooth-brushing, and his hair isn’t sticking up all crazy in the back. Instead, I get to just lie there until the whimpering of the dogs gets to be too much. And that pleases me.

On the other hand, having said that, it doesn’t take long for reality to hit me like a snowball to the face.

It’s still going to be Tuesday, the biggest work-from-home day of my workweek. Now, add on shoveling the front steps, the driveway, a path for the dogs because, being Texans, they won’t go out unless I clear a loop for them in the back yard – and then there’s this: the boy. The boy will be home. All day. Stuck inside. On deadline day. Oh #@&*.

It’s now Tuesday, 10:00 am. Several deliberate doings to mitigate the madness have already been implemented. By 7:00 am, Diego’s bike (the ‘train’ in Diego’s train-centric imagination) is ready, the dogs are leashed (and muzzled where applicable), and the running shoes are tied. We’re on our way to “Mattapoisett Station” as Diego calls the end of the bike path, so Diego can burn off some steam and Mom can burn off some crazy before the work day begins. (All aboard the Autism Express!)

Not even half way down, it’s “abort mission” as the snow begins to fall and cakes immediately to our clothes, two powdered donuts rolling straight into the wind.

Next, it’s a box of candy and a 2,329^th encore of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory to occupy another hour-and-a-half. A few pauses from work to bust out into song or recite the script of our favorite parts, and a few interruptions of hugs, kisses, and loving smiles later, we are brought up to 12:00 noon – time for Diego to start with his train crossing play, dinging on a glass with a chopstick for a little while.

My fingers freeze from typing during sporadic high-pitch train whistles, a sound only a pre-pubescent voice could pierce your ears with. He’s doing it right now. I pause again. Suddenly he’s done with the train. He’s onto playing the organ. I laugh and wonder if it’s too early to sample the snow day stockpile of wine. Ernest Hemingway did say once, “Write drunk, edit sober,” but I don’t think it applies to my occupation today.

It is then that I look up at the window, and it appears the snow has turned to rain. The ‘snow’ part of the snow day might be over, but I’m only halfway through my work and already another train is moving through the house. Now here’s another interruption of another kiss, another hug, another smile. Still more kisses, more hugs, more smiles.

My heart melts with the snow.

This snow day deadline day deal really isn’t turning out that bad. I wonder, by default, do I usually expect the worst in these given situations? And is that a fault of mine, or simply an indication that I accept the steady stream of imperfectness as it comes, as experience has demonstrated, because I know it will come and after we’ve passed it we’re all still okay. The newspaper will get done, Diego will have had a relaxing day in sweatpants, the snow will shovel itself so to speak after an afternoon of rain, and with enough wine stocked up to pour after this baby is put to bed as they say in the newspaper biz, I just might wind up sane when I put my own self to bed.

Isn’t life oftentimes just like this snowstorm? A blizzard barreling towards you and at the last minute bangs a left and all you get are a few flakes. The feeling of the Flu coming on and you only catch a light sneeze. A snow day turned rain day with a surplus of kisses and hugs, a meeting-free evening, and a ‘Snowmageddon’ stockpile of wine. That’s not irony. It’s called a blessing. And blessed be this imperfect life.

By Jean Perry