More snow

Fat flakes falling and thicker than a few minutes ago. Two inches on the ground at daylight, with at least that much more probable.

Carolyn, my older sister, has a picture of her and me standing in snow in the garden area behind the house northwest of Maud, Texas. The picture is from 1950 or 1951. Carolyn was 6 or 7; I was 4 or 5. That was the heaviest snow I remembered until this winter. A couple of weeks ago my wife read a news story that said nation-wide storms like this winter’s occur about every 60 years. That coincides with the picture.

One night in Korea I had second guard shift, midnight until daylight. In the deep of winter in Korea, daylight is later than in other parts of the world. Snow began falling not long after 2 a.m. Duke, my German shepherd sentry dog, didn’t seem to mind the snow. The Army had provided me with clothing sufficient to keep away most of the cold – wool long johns, top and bottom; OD wool trousers and shirt; field trousers with liner; parka with fur-trimmed hood; mittens with wool liners; and Mickey Mouse boots. All those layers and weight made for slow walking.

A truck carried Duke and me to our guard area – officer’s quarters at one side of a hilltop. When daylight arrived, I waited for the truck to return. After more waiting, I decided, given the amount of snow on the road and steepness of the hills over which the road ran, that the truck would not arrive. So, Duke and I walked down the hill and up another hill and down and across and then up the hill to the kennels. The snow was not particularly heavy for Korea, but it was more than I had seen before.

I put Duke in his kennel and broke ice from his water bowl and refilled the bowl from the water tower and then walked down the hill to Sentry Dog Platoon hooch. The diesel space heater roared inside the hooch.