Snows+JG

"Other Snows" Joline Gaudet

One of the articles I read was “Other Snows”, which appeared in the “Shouts and Murmurs” section of the January 22, 1996 edition of The New Yorker. This article is very short; it’s just a page (about 800 words) long.

In this article, McPhee talks about a snow storm that’s hitting New York, and how the Weather Channel and news programs are announcing that it’s the biggest snowfall on record. McPhee is doubtful that it is, and spends the rest of the article reminiscing on “other snows” he’s seen in his lifetime, all of which he believes to be more substantial than the one he’s currently experiencing in New York City, and most of which marked important events in his life and in the world.

At one point, he says “At home in New Jersey, I have been snowed in for as many as three days, but that has less to do with record storms than it has to do with New Jersey’s record.” This is an example of McPhee’s hidden humour that might very well bypass a large number of readers if they aren’t paying attention, aren’t American, etc. I personally liked this line because it gave me a hint as to McPhee’s background; we’ve spent a month reading various things that he’s written, but still don’t know a whole lot about him as a person.

Another story McPhee shares is one about him and his wife being storm-stayed in New York, where they had ordered skis and boots. Dressed in evening wear, they took a taxi to the sporting goods store,picked up their merchandise, and tried to go back to their hotel in the taxi. Because the snow was so high, the taxi dropped them at the end of the street, and McPhee and his wife decided that rather than trying to get to their hotel in their street shows, they would put on their skis and boots right there and ski the rest of the way to the hotel.

McPhee reminisces on several other snows, and returns to the one happening at present in New York City. If it’s really going to break records, McPhee says, it’s still got a long way to go before it beats is personal snow record. He recounts the story of the worst blizzard he’s ever experiences, which happened in Benson, Minnesota, in 1965.

McPhee was on a train from Chicago to Portland, when it stopped in Minnesota. McPhee says that “the snow outside the window was higher than the train.” Not only was the snow too high for the train to plow through, but the heating system on the train failed, and because of this the crew built fires between train cars to try and keep warm. Passengers took turns warming themselves by the fires, had warm meals to eat and “enough booze to build an empire was offered freely to all.” It took an entire day before a snow blower made its way down the rail and to the train, finally freeing it and allowing the train to begin moving again.

The article ends after this story, somewhat abruptly and without much warning. As a reader, I could easily have read on for pages and pages, because this was so well-written, descriptive, and almost an intimate piece of writing.