I stood atop the hill in City Park, watching my daughter sledding with her classmates. They tumbled in the snow, laughing loudly, sliding down the slope one after another as if nothing else mattered on this winter afternoon. Meanwhile, I stood still, the cold creeping relentlessly up from my shoes into my feet. My socks were soaked, my toes first went numb, then simply disappeared. After a while, I couldn’t even feel my face. Well, at least then it didn’t hurt.
I knew this wasn’t a smart choice. I knew I’d catch a cold. Probably she would too. Rational thoughts lined up in my head: it’s cold, everything’s wet, winter is still long, why don’t we just head home? A responsible adult would gather the kid, pull up the hood, and say: that’s enough for today. But I didn’t move.
I caught myself thinking just one sentence: since she was born, there hasn’t been this much snow. Maybe it won’t happen again for a long time. Years might pass before City Park is covered in white again. And maybe next time the snow falls like this, she won’t be searching for me with her eyes at the top of the hill.
On the other side of the hill, teenagers sledded. They were loud, a bit clumsy, and noticeably without parents. They were with friends, teasing and laughing, lost in their own world. I watched them while also watching my daughter, who after every slide, as she reached the bottom, looked up at me like checking if I was there, if I was paying attention. I was. I was watching. In soaked socks, with a face red from the cold, but there.
I thought about how many “maybe for the last time” moments there are in motherhood. Maybe this is the last time we walk home hand in hand from school. Maybe this is the last night she asks for a bedtime story. Maybe this is the last summer she still sits in my lap. These thoughts can be scary or sad, but standing there in the snow, they brought a strange, quiet peace.
Maybe this was the first and last time we played in the snow together. Maybe we’ll never have a snowball fight again. Maybe this will be my only memory of it all. And if that’s the case, I don’t want the strongest memory to be that I was cold. I want to remember how she laughed. How her cheeks flushed. How she threw herself into the snow with full joy, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
I thought about how one day I’ll be old. Maybe I’ll sit in a rocking chair, in a warm room, wearing thick slippers. I’ll look back on this day, this afternoon in City Park. And yes, I think my toe will still ache from this memory. I’ll adjust my slippers out of habit. And I’ll smile.
Because I’ll remember standing there. Not rushing. Letting the moment matter more than my comfort. And I’ll also remember that motherhood is often exactly about this: knowing when to go home, and when it’s worth staying out a little longer, even if it means feeling the cold.
