And the adults, itching to drop their skins of adulthood, to build nations of snow and launch battles against the tyrann
Richard Ney

Leap year. We add one day to add the seconds we missed in the previous four. This winter the snow seems to have gathered its courage from the previous three months of warmth, for it has been snowing since yesterday morning.

When I think of snow, I think of Indiana. In my mind, it is all either gray, dull days that pass like cookies being watched in an oven: they are never done. Or it is the opposite, sun streaming across crusted white fields, the sound of my crunching footsteps as I pick my way across diamonds. My eyes squint to see the horizon, to see the blue shadows that fall on my path.

It is all or nothing, in short. I either sit inside looking out, with dread as a thousand more flakes furiously beat their paths to the ground, or I am outside looking in, making my way through the clouds steaming from my nose.

These are landscapes in my mind from my youth in Indiana. They form a whole that is mostly Winter = gray. Winter = Siberian landscapes, the trees bent across the fields from the Northern winds, corn stalks sticking through the snow banks, shifting granules of snow racing against the gravel road to our house. Cold crying to enter my bedroom, sometimes whispering, sometimes howling at the glass. Sometimes bright sunshine on crystalline trees, bushes, grass, last year's flowers. Sometimes marvelous.

In Armenia, snow is grace. It is forgiveness. All year plants and animals must fight to live. Dogs and Armenians do not respect the English custom but remain in the shade. To do otherwise is more than madness, it is asking for death. This land, which can be so abundant with the gift of water, is usually parched and empty in the summer. Did I say parched? It is barren.

As opposed to Southern Louisiana, where I could watch the spectacle of clouds steaming off the pavements after an afternoon squall, rising majestically for the next day's performance, the clouds in this part of the world are very high, very pale. They are searching for their stage entrance, racing across the sky asking neighbors and colleagues, "Do you know where the stage is? I was in the greenroom having a rollicking good time with the spear carrier, when I heard my cue. I raced up the stairs, only to end up in Armenia! If I could only find stage left."

Sad country. Not to be pitied, but sad all the same. The unique position of this country places it so high above rain patterns, it must find its pleasures in other ways. The colors of rock, of stone, of hard ground. It waits for the rain patterns to shift, as they do in the Winter and early Spring, for the water to rise to the upper elevations. For Noah's Ark to be teased with one more deluge. This happens when it is relatively cold. And the result is snow. Blessed snow. The valleys be damned! We are resting in our dreams, thank you, covering ourselves with blankets of white grain and dreaming of green fields in May.

All is forgiven when the snow falls gently. There is no class system under snow. No poor man, rich man. No adults, only children. As I look out my window on the park below, I see activity and energy unlike anytime during the rest of the year. Children race to slide across the sidewalks, tamping their fists against their snowballs, facing down their elders (who are sternly, nervously eyeing that ball) with a vicious grin that says, "Come on! You want to join me! You want to me to throw it. Each "Don't even think it" from the adult is a dare, a double dare!

And the adults, itching to drop their skins of adulthood, to tumble against the snow banks and shove the cold white ice down their opponent's back one more time, to build nations of snow and launch battles against the tyranny of growing up, they are nervously eyeing that snow ball because they know that if it is launched against their person, they will erupt in a retaliation of playing.

"Don't do it!."

"You dare me! All right, I'll do it!"

Missile launched.

"Earth to adult, Earth to Adult: 'We have a strategic attack against the side of your face. It is time to abort adulthood." Revenge! And one more child is lost in the snow shuffle.

If only for a few seconds.

Perhaps the greatest crime committed against the Armenians in the past few years has been the forced resumption of roles during winter. Adults are not allowed to play, as they scratch subsistence from the Change.

They must worry. Which piece of furniture shall we sell to buy bread? Which to buy kerosene? Did the American truck come today? No? When will it? How much kerosene did they give you? How much did they take? 2 liters less? That is good! We celebrate tonight! They only took two. Four? They took four? But how can we make it to the next truck? Will there be another truck? How will the baby sleep at night in this cold? I don't know.

I don't know.

Children must play unnaturally long because the schools do not stay open in the Winter for lack of heat. They cannot predict the patterns of living that provide security, because those patterns have been changed. They cannot learn the options of living, the choices that becoming an adult should bring. Parents must forever age with worry, because there is not enough power to run their businesses, their factories. There are no jobs.

"We want work. Only work." From the Americans, "You may have a handout." "We don't want a handout, we want work". Slowly, their lives are forever changed as each piece of hard earned furniture is sold or burned for heat.

Armenians are survivors. What they want is progress. To be a survivor is the first instinct. The second is to progress. If there is an American Dream, it is the opportunity to progress. It is the same dream of all nations, I think.

And the snow continues to fall outside my window.