Snow Day, Hot Topic

So.
It snowed last night. While it didn't snow as much as it could have, it was a nice wet snow for the kids to play in earlier in the day...for about twenty minutes. Why do I see all these Facebook pictures of perfect snowmen and smiling children, and all I see and hear is whining and complaining of cold? Maybe I just have summer kids. Or maybe some of you are better at making snowmen and posing your children around it, and I'm a deadbeat who just wants to take a shower while the kids are outside.

Whatever.

Anyway, it snowed, and then it started to blow. Cars using our road for alternative routes home thanks to the Super Bowl (and the beverages, I'm assuming) seemed to slow and chug by our house, fighting the crummy roads. The girls were placing bets not only about the winners of the Super Bowl, but whether or not they would have school. By 11:00 PM, we had two people in the ditch, and, Joe, being the good Samaritan, went out to pull the girl's car out and her boyfriend's, too (even though I begged him not to, because I have been watching Scandal and there are evidently a lot of people who want to kill each other...but ooooohhhh...it's so good.).

By 5:00 AM, we wondered about school, and received the call, later than usual, but were not surprised:

School cancelled.

Here's what is surprising to me, and I'm sorry if this makes folks irritated.

If school had not been cancelled, everyone (okay, the maybe just the loud people on Facebook...can you be loud?) would have been yelling about the safety of the children, etc.

However, when school is cancelled, parents are irritated about the time frame, posting road conditions and griping about finding places for their displaced kids to go. News flash: Have a plan B, and C, and/or keep your comments quiet so that people like me who had to quit her job to stay with my gaggle of children won't become high and mighty and post a snarky blog post about snow days.

I admit it. I used to complain too.

I was a teacher in one town, and lived in another. I had to take my little Cavalier through treacherous roads to get to work. However, it was all on city streets and Interstates. I never considered the bus factor. The side road. The country kids who have to bump along in a bus on a regular day, let alone one where roads are less than favorable.

Then we moved out here.

Our road drifts in three places. From our house from the "hard road" is just shy of a mile. It drifts in THREE PLACES in that one little mile. Three PLACES. Friends, when the wind is howling and your road commissioner is doing his best to tend to all the little side roads in the township, you can't keep up with drifting snow. It's like me trying to keep my house orderly on a snow day. Not going to happen.

Until we moved out here and had school aged kids, I never got it. Snow days are no joke out here. They are inconvenient to those of you in town. They are scary to those of you who still have to drive to work. And I'm certain (and although seemingly not thanks to this post's tone...I do empathize) that they are logistically a nightmare to get your kids where they can be entertained, safe, and not at your desk during a conference call. However, if your school district is a rural district, you're at the mercy of your road conditions at exactly the time that the buses need to be rolling out. Snow routes could be employed, and we could try to get the kids there ourselves, should the school decide to not run buses, but what's the harm in one day off? In the grand scheme of life, is one day off of work or school that hot of a topic? Sheesh.

I would never want to make that call.  Ever. No one is ever happy or satisfied or pleased. Ever.

However, on days like today when I want to tear my hair out with the bickering and constant in and out of the snow and wet gloves and snotty noses and hot chocolate (did I mention our oldest has the stomach flu too? Good times.), I am thankful to have received the call that school was canceled. Our kids' safety would have been at risk, had they ridden the bus today. It was nasty out here.

So calm down, everyone. Go out and make your beautiful snowmen with your children, and take your picture and #makeyourmemories. But don't come road tripping out here to see what our drifted road is like. I may hold my good hearted husband back. You might be an axe murderer. I watch Scandal, you know.