The Story of the Snowman

A lot of people have commented on the great snowman, so I thought I’d tell you the story.

Baltimore is also known at Small-timore. Everyone knows everyone else or has some funny connection. I am a 12th generation Baltimorean, with three siblings and 28 first cousins, so the tentacles are all over the place. My mother lives in a compound with a lot of people she’s known for years and I have lunch with her on Sundays. Several months ago, someone stopped me and said that they read the blog (Thanks!) and then told my mother’s neighbour who was tutoring the woman’s children. Whew! Did you get that?I was at lunch at my mother’s with my cousins from Atlanta on New Year’s Eve. We had gotten about four inches of light powdery snow that morning, and when I arrived, there was the most amazing snowman in front of the building. When I went to look at it, I saw the charming details, including arms, eyes made from faded flowers, a chain of ivy around its neck and some holly in its hand! What I really liked was that you could still see the handprints on the snowman and could tell how they’d patted the snow into place. Last week, I received an e-mail from another of my mother’s neighbours telling me about the snowman. The neighbour who tutors had been shown the blog by her tutee, informed the neighbour who’d made the snowman and he’d e-mailed me… with the information that his wife and my mother were schoolmates 60+ years ago!His Estonian daughter-in-law had made the snowman with her daughter. The snowman was dressed with the greens of nature rather than lumps of coal.

Thanks for making such a cheery snowman!