What Can A Snowman Say?

 Seven and one-half years ago, when we moved into our house, our neighbor across the street was a young man in his twenties.  Three other young men lived with him.  He met a girl.  We had them over for dinner. They fell in love and became engaged.  The other three young men moved out.  The only public gathering we attended during Covid in 2020 was the wedding of our young neighbor and his bride.

 A year later, she gave birth to their first child, Charlie.  Yesterday we watched from our window as two-year-old Charlie and his father built a snowman in their yard.  As we expected, knowing our neighbors, it was a huge snowman, over 5 feet tall, with a wide grin, a carrot nose, button eyes,  and stick arms extended as if waiting for a hug!

 It reminded me of a poem I wrote about snowmen when we lived in Minnesota. 

He stands outside

smiling through the night

smiling though the day

with a wide-eyed gaze from coal black eyes

punctuated by the point of a carrot nose.

 

A blue-stocking cap warms his frozen head

while a red and white scarf flutters in the breeze,

tickling his tummy

softly patted into place by small hands

scooping great scoops of snow

and fashioning his form,

till he stood where he stands,

stick arms spread in a welcome greeting

to family and friend and passerby

signifying by his constant cheer

that a child lives here.

 Last week, when a rare winter storm swept the South, snowmen made their appearances in New Orleans, Houston and Galveston.  They are a universal breed, transcending generations, the product of creative imaginations, uniting generations from ages past, a non-digital race that binds our human hearts to one another.  They reach across language, ethnicity, culture and time, created amid giggles, squeals and laughter.  In Minnesota, a snowman can last for months.  In the South, a few days at best. Some of them have already returned to puddles in the yard.  But while they last, they cheer us up and give us hope. 

 It took the birth of a child named Charlie to create our snowman across the street.  Like other snowmen in our neighborhood, he reminds me of one of Jesus’ profound object lessons to his disciples, “Jesus called a little child over to him. He had the child stand among them. ³ Jesus said, “What I’m about to tell you is true. You need to change and become like little children. If you don’t, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven,” (Matthew 18:2-3).