It's about a quarter past 5 p.m. in Dallas, Texas, on December 29. And it is snowing.
But if you're one of my readers who lives someplace where it really snows in the winter, let me warn you. This is a Dallas, Texas kind of snowfall. It's snowing and raining simultaneously. The snowflakes are almost indistinguishable from the raindrops — except that the raindrops are just a little bit faster in their descent.
I thought about taking a digital photograph of it and posting it, but, at this point, I don't think the eye could tell the difference between snowflakes and raindrops in a still photo. You could tell that something was coming down, but you have to watch it come down to comprehend what is happening.
Besides, there's no accumulation. The ground is warm enough that snowflakes melt on impact, if not while they're still airborne.
Talking about a Dallas snowfall is almost an oxymoron. It's like talking about an Anchorage heat wave. (What would that be, anyway? A daytime high of 70° on the Fourth of July?)
We had a pretty significant snowfall (for Dallas) on Christmas Eve. There was enough of it that the pastor at my church was inspired to go on Facebook and tell people that it qualified as a white Christmas — in case the snow melted by morning, which it tends to do in north Texas. Well, the snow never did anything much to the streets, but it did accumulate on grass and rooftops, and we really did have a white Christmas morning in Dallas.
The snow began to melt away as the daytime temperatures rose above freezing, but places that were shaded kept the accumulated snow awhile longer. By Christmas night, most of the snow was gone, but you could still see some patches here and there.
Just north of here, in Oklahoma, I heard about accumulation and snowdrifts. Roads were closed. Here in Dallas, we got the sense that we had narrowly avoided some really severe weather.
This time, it looks like it won't even get cold enough for much, if any, of this snow to still be snow by sunrise.
Such is the nature of snowfall in Dallas.
No comments:
Post a Comment