ice worms

the streets are clear and there's a fine drizzle in the air here in victoria, but in vancouver, i see, there are five centimetres of snow on the ground. these weather images remind me of one night, a few years ago, when i was living in vancouver myself. i was working late in an office building and had seen, to my joy and excitement, the snow begin to fall in the afternoon. my excitement grew as i saw that the snow was STICKING.

i'm an east-coaster, a grace baby (to all you haligonians) and i've never gotten over being excited by the first snowfall of winter. i don't even snowboard.

anyway, nothing could have prepared me for the chaos that was awaiting my eager glee. i stepped outside from my building's lobby that evening, stopped, and stared.

the air was full of the acrid smoke of burning rubber as car after car spun its treadless tires in an attempt to leave the spot where it had been parked for the day. the cars that were lucky enough to be on the road all fishtailed wildly, and sometimes spun in complete, slow circles, the people inside clamouring and scrambling like unwilling captives for escape. everywhere were shouts and cries of alarm, panic, and near homicidal rage, people and cars shooting in all directions like they do when giant lizards stomp through urban areas in sci-fi movies.

i watched one wild-eyed woman drive white-knuckled at a breathtaking two kilometres an hour with a man tailgating two inches behind her, leaning on his horn while hanging out the window hurling every obscenity towards her with aneurysm-inducing ferocity. i don't think she noticed. she was staring at some point in the distance with the intensity of a person who believes that it is their gaze alone keeping the horizon in its place.

i saw another well-intentioned gal attempt to direct traffic at an intersection whose lights were down. there she stood, defying death in her office clothes, performing what looked like an interpretive dance commentary on corporate frustration. none of the drivers approaching her had any idea of how to follow her erratic and contradictory gestures, let alone any control over their cars, so they just tried not to kill her as they meandered helplessly through the intersection.

no traffic lights were functioning. pedestrians began adopting a herd-like mentality, waiting at curbs until sufficient numbers had arrived, and then charging across the road en masse, figuring that if they all rushed at the same time, the car-wolves would only be able to pick off a few of the people-deer, and most of them would make it.

on my walk home i saw busses sliding broadside down hills the size of a ballet dancer's boob, i saw groups of burly young men give up their entire evening helping cars up one particular hill, rushing out to push as soon as each car began its inevitable slide backwards near the crest. i've never seen anything like it. there couldn't have been more than five inches of wet snow on the ground.