Snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes...

There's something more clarifying and breathtaking about snow than about rain.

Since High School English with Ms. Priego and the endless, labor-some explanations of the Hero's journey, I have felt as though rain was a sign. A rainfall felt like a call for change, for growth, or simply a chance to cry in which your tears did not have to be alone. I felt clean when it rained, and I often found the rain would clear my thoughts. I have had a lot of moments of clarity and realization since I moved to the city. A few of them have been in the midst of a summer rainfall.

My trip to work is an awkward one as far as the transportation goes, I have to take the express train to Columbus Circle and then walk a few blocks to a cross town train in order to get to the East Side. Oddly, I generally find myself grateful for the walk from one train to the next; it's a moment for me to enjoy the city. Columbus Circle is my favorite place in the city, what with the view of Central Park, the Time Warner Building, and just the New York hustle of that spot at all hours. That said, getting out and walking through it to my next destination, it's always a moment of clarity. In both directions on my trip today, my moment of clarity was filled with softly falling snow.

I realized how lucky I am not to be a native to this city and how I can still find myself entirely taken with the first snow. The little patches green in front of fancy hotels and restaurants, usually a small and sad impersonation of a garden, however well dressed they might be, remind me now of a tiny fairy-tale land, mini trees glittering as the orange street lights dance on the snow. I don't know if anyone who's lived here for a lifetime sees it like that. I have to wonder how long the novelty will last for me, and I sincerely hope it will last as long as I live in this city. I'm told over and over again that snow in New York is dirty and disgusting, only pretty for fleeting moments. I occasionally feel overwhelmed by everyone's negative picture of what weather in New York in like. I then find myself reminded with a snowflake stuck to my eyelashes, that there is a yin and a yang to everything. I would never trade the moments that make me smile in order to rid myself of that which I am less fond.

My moment of clarity for today was just this: Life is beautiful. There is so much to hate, to be frustrated by, to feel jealous of... but there is just as much to love, to revel in, to be amazed by. Many of those moments come in the form of a new job, moving across the country, falling in love... the big, life changing moments. However, today I was reminded, that there is also just snowfall, light, a strangers smile, friends, music...

Revel in the little stuff, it doesn't cost anything and it makes you feel like a million dollars.