I don't get it! What's the big deal?

Growing up in Detroit, snow was something to look forward to. Between our house and the 'party store' next door, Cincinnati calls these pony kegs - where did that name come from? Now they are referred to as convenience stores. But I am already off track with my story. (Is that a squirrel?)

Anyway, I remember my parents and the guy who owned the store would drag their garden hoses out and let the water run in the field between us. Remember this is in the city - "field" is a relative term here, it was really just a vacant lot. Because the ground was hard, the water would have no where to go and it would freeze. That made our own personal ice skating pond. No side rails to grab onto, no helmets, no lights at night...just sheer unprotected fun.

Skating, snowball fights, snowman building, angels in the snow, and when we were real lucky we would go snow skiing. There was also this fun thing called "bumper riding." This is where you would grab a car's back bumper as slide down the street like water skiing. This was only if the streets were slippery enough and car was going slow enough, usually down a residential street. Of course, I never did such a thing. :-)

Oh, all the memories of winters in Detroit.

I don't ever recall a 'snow day' when I was young, nor did I ever ride a school bus, we walked to school, and made it as fun as we wanted it to be.

Another memory I have is one time my dad digging a path into the family car from the passenger side (because you couldn't even find the car from the drivers side), and then insisting on "driving" the car out of the snow. It was a big ole car, come to think of it, all cars were big then. Anyway, he managed to do it, and it left a wall of snow that was higher than the top of the car. Funny the things you remember from your childhood, isn't it? It probably wasn't like that at all, but that is what I remember from my young impressionable age, and I'm sticking with it.

One good thing about growing up in Detroit, is I learned at an early age to love the snow as much as the summertime. See Detroit isn't all that bad! So what's the big deal here?