Indian Time - A Voice from the Eastern Door

When we got our first snowfall little brother was beyond excited. He yelled, “it’s finally winter! I love winter!” He rushed in his room to get dressed. He came back out with shorts on, a sweatshirt, and mismatched socks. I had to tell him he needed different clothes and he just about fell apart. I had to go pick him out some weather appropriate stuff to go on under his snowsuit. Once he got outside he was in full explore mode. He dug in the snow like it was sand. He used his backhoe to push around snow and pile it up. He ran back in the house to grab cars. He was busy burying them and using his backhoe to dig them back out. After a while his cheeks were rosy and I was feeling the cold so I told him it was time to go back in. He pouted and his famous lip made an appearance all the way through the front door. I planned on distracting him so he could warm up over the course of an hour but he was determined to go right back outside. I tried bribing him with hot chocolate but he said, “I don’t like chocolate!” then I tried to talk him into playing a game with me and he pretended not to hear me. A few minutes later he came up to me and pulled my hands to his face and ears and he said, “See momma I’m not cold! I’m warm!” We got his gear back on and went outside again.

He spent a good two hours outside that day before it started to get dark out and the temperature dropped more. He slept good that night from all the fresh air. The first thing he did in the morning was ask, “Can I go play outside?” He asked me that before he even got his sleepyhead behind out of bed to use the bathroom. I thought ‘wow this kid really does love winter.’ I made him eat breakfast first which he inhaled in an attempt to make it outside faster. That day he wanted to make tracks and trails through the snow which he did. He also wanted to look at all the animal tracks in the field. He knew the difference between our dog Marf’s prints and a rabbit. He laughed about the bird ones because he says, “They only have skinny toes.” That day it was much warmer out so we got to stay out for longer intervals than the day before. At lunchtime I told him we had to go in to eat and his response was, “Bring it out here to me, I’m a snow boy!”