First Snow

"It is snowing."

I had flown north to see her for Valentine's Day, and had got to Fukuyama late the night before.

So I slept late, and was woken at 8.28 by the beloved sending me a text message telling me what the day's weather was like.

And so it was that, half-way through my 46th year, my first direct experience of snow was through the window of my business hotel in central Fukuyama.

For me, it was all new and magnificent, and I wanted to spend as much time as possible in the brisk, chill air.

For the beloved, it was all familiar and cold, and she wanted to spend as much time as possible in the warmth and air conditioning of a Fukuyama shopping centre.

I had just travelled 7700km to be with the beloved. I didn't want to go to a shopping centre.

I wanted to drive to Onomichi.

"My car does not have snow tyres, the roads are dangerous, and you're not used to driving through snow" she said.

So we went to the shopping centre.

The next day wasn't snowing, but Monday's snow was still thick on the ground in the hills behind Fukuyama. I felt like we'd just driven into Fifth Heaven, but the beloved started to wonder about my sanity when I asked her if "we" could make a snowman.

"We should have done this yesterday, when the snow was fresh," she said as I let her make the small (45cm tall) snowman in the carpark at the Miroku no Sato amusement park.

She gave him two twigs for arms, fallen leaves for eyes and a mouth, and a fern frond for a 'necktie'.

He looked really cute.

We went to visit him the next day, but he wasn't so cute 24 hours later.

He had started to melt. He had fallen over, and had lost his arms, eyes, mouth, and necktie.

For a snowman, life may not be nasty and brutish -- but it certainly is "short".