Mary Novaria

This story first appeared in the Huffington Post on 3/6/2013.  Unless you're on a ski trip, snow and travel generally aren't a great mix. Or so I thought. As luck, or Mother Nature, would have it, a trip to visit my mother was bookended by blizzards and I was snowbound. Hadn't I loved snow days when I was a kid? Even as a mom, snow days were a welcome reprieve from frantic morning routines. But a snow day when I had things to do? How dare this happen? And how did I manage to pick this very week to visit? I almost succumbed to angst and frustration. I hadn't seen my mom for six months and was now stuck just a few miles away. I'd scheduled a lunch date with an old friend and hoped to catch a cup of coffee with a few others. My plans were drifting along with the snow. Schools closed, flights were cancelled and streets awaited the plow. Weather folk declared "snowmageddon," reporters interviewed the stranded, photographers shot barren grocery shelv...

February 1 – It’s snowing like crazy outside, just like it was at about the same time nine years ago. Somehow, in the midst of all the snow and ice, my brother and his wife got to the hospital for the birth of their firstborn, Addison Rose. She was one of many gifts delivered that year by the storm. I had no idea when the first flakes fell that I’d soon have my best friends under my roof. Mona, Jeanie and I are “heart” friends who weather storms together. We’ve shared the gale force winds brought by children, the squalls of marriage, the losses of parents and jobs. We’ve prayed together, played together and stayed together regardless of geography. We love each other's kids, husbands and dogs. We stick together through thick and thin--literally and figuratively. That winter blizzard provided a joyful and rare occurrence to gather since the three of us—Mona, Jeanie and I—no longer lived in the same town. The Amtrak, bringing Mona in from western Kansas, was running late. Of course ...