A Word In Your Ear - January 21, 2016

I have always kept a child-like wonder for snow, especially at Christmas time. To me it lifts the spirits during dark winter months. How much better a crisp and frosty day, than all that wind and rain since autumn?

“We were Skyping with our grandchildren in Australia,” said a pal playing tennis with me on the indoor court at South Shore on Sunday.

“I swept the screen round to show them our snow-covered garden. The four-year-old immediately asked excitedly, ‘Can we come and live in England?’”

It brings a natural delight to youngsters’ faces. Even when one is older, and not required to drive or turn out for work, it’s a cosy feeling looking out from a warm home with steaming mug of tea in hand on to glistening snow and our garden robin.

All right, it can be treacherous under foot. However, She Who Knows has special spiked snow shoes for those icy days here in Great Marton. It’s bracing but also fun, as long as you remember woolly hats and gloves,.

In the past, when working on this newspaper full-time, it brought out the team spirit as we who lived closest trekked into the office and took on others’ jobs as well as our own.

Then, when distant living colleagues finally got through the snow, we’d put them up overnight at home – perhaps after a fish and chip supper at Marton’s famous Cottage chippy.

However, as temperatures rise a little higher this week, we have not yet seen the end of the rain. Perhaps we’ll also be seeing more of the white stuff as February draws near...

After that, of course, we can look forward to spring – now just around that snowy corner.

* For Roy’s books, visit www.royedmonds-blackpool.com