I'm sure most of you know (because you live here), we experienced a bit of a Snowmaggedon a couple of weeks ago here in Birmingham.
Thankfully, Mr. Smith and I were only "mildly inconvenienced" by all of this, as we are saying. Hearing the stories of co-workers and friends trapped on interstates for over 10 hours with their kiddos, without food or diapers, make us feel very thankful about the whole thing.
And for those of you not living here and thinking we are all crazy for reacting this way, let me tell you how it all went down.
Monday night, I was watching the weather while getting this preggers body as comfortable as possible in the bed. The meterologist said we'd be lucky to see a few flurries, so my wool pants, light black turleneck and black heels seemed fine with a peacoat. No need to worry.
I went into a meeting at 10am, glimpsed some light flurries out the window, and didn't think anything else about it. When we got out at 11am, the city was covered in snow.
Right about that time, every school in the area and most business mass-closed. Including H's school, which said they were closing and to have your child picked up by 12:30pm.
This mass exodus led to complete madness. It took me an hour to get to my parking deck and make my way down 3 levels due to the gridlock of packed streets. My practical side screamed to just wait it out inside, back in my office, for a couple of hours since I hadn't eaten lunch yet and already needed to relieve a pregnant bladder.
I parked at the inside deck and walked myself back into my office, where I ended up staying for the next 30 hours. That's right - I had to spend the night at the office, with a handful of co-workers. As the afternoon progressed, I kept waiting for things to die down, only the opposite. More and more stories of car accidents, people trapped in cars, and people abandoning their cars to walk to their home or kids' school surfaced. I looked around my office - there was my gym bag with tennis shoes, t-shirt, and yoga pants to sleep in. There was my snack drawer. There was heat. There was a loveseat and blanket being offered to me by protective, sweet co-workers. Sold.
Mr. Smith took the same approach and after us deciding that no school would just kick a 2-year-old to the curb and that we weren't the only parents stuck, he stayed at work until that evening, finally reaching H's school around 9pm. He decided to stay there overnight, since H was asleep and everything was completely iced over. Plus, the sweet ladies there fed him dinner.
Mr. Smith and H made it back to our house that Wednesday morning, while I waited until Wednesday afternoon to make my home slowly home. The normally 20-minute drive took 3 hours due to ice, snow, crowding, and dodging the deserted cars.
Was it a pain? Yes, but we were lucky.
I was lucky that I had a gym bag and extra clothes, food, full tank of gas, and new tires.
Mr. Smith had a 4-wheel drive truck and hunting gear.
Compared to everyone else, we got off very, very easy.
And enjoyed a free "Snow Day" at home with H on Thursday!
