Welcome back and welcome to Day 25.
Hope you’re all well and looking forward to some good eats plus family time this week.
As we move along in the countdown, we can all dream of not only more daylight, but also more temperate climes. (Though, we’ve experienced remarkably warm temperatures in the New York area in recent days, the specter of a long, cold winter is always there.)
And please take my word as a former Rochester, NY boy. Except for maybe Buffalo, NY, located about 70 miles to the southwest, you’d be hard pressed to find a snowier and colder place than Mustard City (likely reference to French’s mustard, the headquarters of which were once located there).
The thing about “the usual,” though (both good and bad, I guess), is that it’s not “the always.” So, there’s always the chance that something unexpected might happen. And that was the deal one day in early Spring 1973. I was just a kid, so I never really checked it out, but I have to believe that March 25th of that year was a record breaker.
I woke up early that day, with the morning sun streaming through my bedroom window. I looked out to see that there was plenty of snow on the ground, and that was pretty typical of March in that part of Western New York.
When I got downstairs, my mom had my breakfast waiting for me, my bag lunch made and one of my heavier winter jackets hanging on the hook in the laundry room.
We kept a thermometer in the window of the kitchen, and I could see that it read a less-than-balmy 29 degrees. Sure that was cold, but there were plenty of times that winter that I walked out the door with temps well below zero.
I waited at the bus stop for a few minutes, only shivering slightly. And by the time I arrived at school, I stepped off the bus into that streaming sun.
A short while later, right as my home room teacher, Mrs. Sonneman, began to call the role, it started.
Those of you who know me personally probably recall that I have a pretty freaky memory. I guess we’ll have to see how long I can hang onto that, but for now, word of honor, all of these details are plenty accurate.
Anyway, every pair of eyes in that classroom started staring at the rising mercury on the thermometer outside the large glass window. (Yeah, I guess when it comes to any place with temperature extremes – both cold and hot – there are always plenty of reminders around.) Even our teacher looked out the window, fascinated by what was happening.
By 1030am or so, the temperature had already risen to 50 degrees, the mid-morning March sun atypically streaming down, simply liquifying the snow that had covered the playground blacktop for the better part of a week.
Much like that scene in Risky Business (that wouldn’t be released for another decade back then, featuring a then-young up and comer named Tom Cruise), the clock on the wall seemed to be moving backwards. Recess wouldn’t start until 1230p, and every single kid at the Brooks Hill School collectively chomped at the proverbial bit, waiting to sprint outside.
By noon, the temperature had reached the low 60s, icicles dripping and falling and sliding off the roof of my vocabulary class. Just another half hour to go.
And then finally, the bell.
To this day, I’m not quite sure how no one got badly injured or trampled or worse, as hundreds of kids poured out into the recess area. Within moments, every kid grade K-5 began doing his/her imitation of an overly eager pre-pubescent exotic dancer, collectively – and enthusiastically – stripping off every single article of outer clothing.
For my part, I had chucked away my short-waisted Gerry jacket (depending on your demographic, you may remember those), my sweater that my late grandma Florence had knitted for me and was running around with several of my buddies playing a game of “kill the guy with the ball” or “cream the carrier,” as it was sometimes known.
When the bell rang at exactly 115pm, the temperature had risen above the 70-degree mark. Two boys from my class, Jim and Rob, did everything they could to convince me to ditch. Sadly, though, I was just too chicken shit to try it.
A few hours later, though, I made it back to my house, with huge patches of fledgling grass poking through what was left of the snow, amid pools of standing water.
By 330pm, the temperature was just shy of 80, and the clothes I still had on my back were completely soaked.
Like I mentioned earlier, when you’re a kid, you don’t tend to concern yourself with records. So, despite my recall of the events of that day, I don’t know if that day was a record-setter or not.
What I do know, though, is that day at the Brooks Hill School (in a suburb of Rochester, NY called Fairport), I got a chance to experience the joy of the unexpected. And in the more than 50 years since, I still think of that day every time the mercury portends spring ahead of schedule.
Catch you all tomorrow.
JFish
@Copyright 2024 by John L. Fischer
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