Surviving the Great Blizzard of 2011

Giddy is not a place I get to very often, yet for some reason the thought of snow banks and snowballs and snowy landscapes filled me with a giddy kind of wonder that is today making me (as so many others have in the not-so-distant past) question my sanity. It was just last week that the weather persons were absolutely florescent with excitement over their certainty that the San Francisco Bay Area would be host to that rarest of Bay Area meteorlogical phenomenon - snow.

Once the weather persons started shouting about it, the TV anchors picked up on it, and then the print people started in, and yes, even your humble Internet news service providers (blush) began touting the notion that our local environs would soon resemble the Arctic Circle, if only for a day. It wasn't hysteria, exactly, but it was a few notches down from there. And the thing is, all the evidence pointed away from the idea. Evidence that was right in front of our eyes (blue skies, normal looking weather patterns, etc.), rather than front and center in our imaginations.

What is it, then, about the thought of snow that makes us so excited? How many images have we had in the past couple of months from the poor East and Midwest, "socked in," as they say, by tons of the white stuff? New York City was virtually frozen solid there for a few days, with most activities coming to a standstill. Power lines and roadways become memories in blizzards, as do minor things like the ability to leave your home in the morning. We don't have to shovel sidewalks around here, ever. And the thought of wearing more than a couple of layers is just, well, silly.

So why this great excitement over the idea that it might snow? Well, it never happens, so there's the novelty factor. For us in the news business, it means covering a story for at least a couple of days that is relatively simple and easy to explain ("It snowed. It never does. But it did. Wow."). But it feels like more than that. There's a wonderment involved, a feeling of watching nature unleashed that isn't threatening, but is rare and theatrical. We all know that sooner or later, a thunderous earthquake is going to cause major havoc, and we wait for that with dread. But snow - well, snow is benign. And cool. And very temporary. You make a snowman, throw a few snowballs, take some cool iPhone videos to show your friends and relatives (unless they live in the Midwest or Northeast), and move on. You've got a story to tell for years to come, and it didn't involve a single action of the Red Cross. 

Alas, our great snowstorm didn't come to pass. It did in , near Burbank, as my Patch colleague Donna Evans was more than glad to illustrate. But here, we got a sunny day with bright blue skies, birds singing, yada yada. You know, the kind of February day people east of here look at and think "I gotta move there some day." And many of them do, until the ground shakes.

I have to admit to being a little disappointed. But when we get a glorious day like we got on Saturday, where the colors are downright vivid, the sun is full of attitude and the whole pastoral glory of our fair city is on display, I become grateful that the Great Martinez Blizzard of 2011 was kind enough to pass us by.