Mittens or Gloves?

With Thanksgiving a week away, plans for the table were taking shape, grocery lists made and re-made. Recipes to try, or maybe not this year, fear of failure looms with each picture of food I see. Memories of childhood play at the edge of my mind and interrupt the things I should be concentrating on. When I look out the window I can see...

My brothers round, red faces come into view, cheeks blistered by the cold, and yet we couldn't make ourselves go in and get warm by the fire. When gloves would become soaked with wet snow, we'd make old soaks do the trick. They would grow longer the wetter and heavier they became, we didn't care. Finally, our short legs could barely move and we knew we had to give in and go home. That was the longest walk of the day.

One year, we went deep into the woods in search of the perfect spot to build an igloo. Snow seldom fell in our part of the country and we wanted to make the most of it. This time, it had snowed almost two whole feet. We'd stomped out a sled run so we could go faster, and made three snowmen, so an igloo was the next logical choice.

We didn't have a clue how to go about it, but we'd brought a couple of shovels and a plastic bowl. It was my idea to make a mold with it, sort of like the jello thing at holidays. My brother laughed at me, you know the way boys have a habit of doing when they're still young enough to think girls are stupid.

“I think this spot will do.” Mac, the oldest of the brothers stabbed his spade in the snow and rested his foot on it.

I looked around me and the trees seemed to have changed shape. They loomed above us like they were closing ranks around us. I could see eyes staring at me from all the shadowy tree trunks. I'm sure they were real. “Maybe we should go back closer to home. This is awful far away...” I said this in a small voice. I didn't want them to laugh at me again, but the snow had taken on a grayish color in the shadows of the forest and I was a little scared. My nose started to run and the cold was stinging my eyes.

“Nope. Start digging right here.” Mac grabbed his shovel and began to throw snow into a pile. His breath had created a smoky swirl around his head. He looked like a dragon.

My eyes got wider and wider as I stared at him. They filled with water and made the tree trunks seem to move and sway about. I tried to wipe them, it didn't help. Since I didn't want to seem like a baby I took my bowl and began to pile snow in it. When I dumped it out, it had made sort of a round brick.

The snot from my nose froze on my upper lip and felt like an ice cycle was stuck there. I dumped the bowl of snow out in a pile, it seemed to work pretty good. In no time at all I had built a wall by piling up my molds of snow. Grinning widely I called over to Mac. “Hey, look at this.” I waited with pride for him to congratulate me.

His lip puckered out and his eyebrows almost touched together in the middle. “So?” He turned his back to me and started to pack the snow he'd piled up with his hands, glancing back over his shoulder he glared at me. “The igloo is over here.”

Now that boy knew that mine was a lot better than his, but today he was the boss—only because he was bigger than me. I dragged myself up and went over to where he was kneeling. For a minute I just stood behind him. I was afraid that he'd leave me if I made him mad enough, so I gave in. I knelt down and began to take my plastic mold and build snow into another wall. All the while thinking, I'd had just about enough snow fun for one day.

Mac stood up, with his hands on his hips he said, “Ya'll help me get some sticks to build the roof with. Then we'll put snow on top of them.”

A few feet away some spindly trees stuck up through the snow. They didn't have many branches and those were stubby. Mac grabbed one and tried to break it off. It wouldn't budge, so he stepped up on top of it and jumped. The small, but fiercely strong sapling, flew right up and slapped him hard. Right in the face. Furious with the thing, especially since we all saw it happen, he grasped it tight and pulled until his face turned beet red. It seemed to those of us watching, that little tree came to life and yanked Mac right off his feet. He landed face down in the snow and came up spitting snow. With his ice covered glove he swiped at his eyes, knocking his wool hat off. It landed at the base of that monster twig of a tree.

I stood perfectly still, gritting my teeth while this scene unfolded. I didn't know what he would do next and I was afraid it would involve me, whatever it turned out to be. A moment later, Mac picked up his wet hat and started kicking at my wall. Knocking down every inch of it.

“Stop!” I cried. Before I knew what I doing, I flew on top of his back and started pounding on it. It couldn't have hurt through all the thick clothing. After all, his coat was two sizes too big. But I tried. I wanted to hurt him. My gloves fell off and we began to roll around through the snow. The knowledge that it was futile to continue finally settled on me and I rolled away and sat up. The snow had stuck to me like paper mache and wouldn't brush off.

Mac sat up and began to laugh. “Ha, serves you right.” He stuck out his tongue and giggled.

I'm not sure I'd ever felt so much anger building inside me. My temples felt like they would burst and my fingers hurt like crazy from clenching them together. My gloves were lost beneath the snow we'd wrestled around in and I didn't feel like digging to find them. With slow, measured steps I started for home. The sun just barely peeked through those frightful tree tops and was going down fast. The little boys ran to my side, more than ready to go with me.

“Aw, ya'll are just chickens.” Mac made noises like a chicken and picked up his shovel. “I ain't quitting.”

We didn't even hear the last part. My youngest brother was so tired he wanted me to carry him. That wasn't even going to happen. As we sloughed through the snow the fluffy mess went in my boots and I could hardly move my legs. The boys started to cry and hung onto my coattails, almost pulling me over. It felt like I was dragging logs behind me.

I glanced over my shoulder and saw that Mac had started to follow us. Huh, not so brave after all. 

Up ahead the moon's early light sent blue splinters across the shiny snow to guide us home. As we came out of the woods an amber glow welcomed from the windows at the house. We ran the rest of the way to the door and left those eery eyes behind us for another day.