It can happen to anyone.
The urge is pure.
You wake up to fresh snowfall. On goes your jacket and gloves and you’re out into the crisp, cool air.
You reach down to clump some between your hands. The snow is sticky and soft. You reach down for more and pack it in. Soon it’s so big that you set it down to roll. How the snow from the ground sticks to it. How it grows.
Behind you there are other places with other hands rolling balls and little snow left on the ground. Ahead of you is clean and white.
It’s only when looking back that a trail appears.
Sometimes you push alone. Sometimes others push with you. It can be just one person or a few.
When you all push together the ball rolls faster. It grows fast too. Wonder at how this thing that once fit in the palm of your hand that now has room for two, three, four pairs of hands.
There are moments the ball rolls so fast you fall behind. You’re no longer guiding it— You’re chasing it! There are moments when it won’t budge and you have to count to three so you can all push it in unison.
It’s okay if the other hands push somewhere slightly off course. You’ll stubbornly fight to redirect it to where you want it to go. Humbly, the best direction is often neither where you nor they are pushing, but the place it ends up rolling somewhere in between.
If the other hands are pushing back directly against yours, the ball will falter. As it does, you might start to argue. In those times, hands might have to stop pushing. Sometimes they’re theirs. Sometimes they’re yours.
It’s hard to tell what part of the snowball is theirs and what part is yours. It’s senseless to try to split it up. Instead, it’s best when someone reaches toward the ground, clumps snow between their hands, and starts afresh.
There is grief in parting. But that needn’t be all you feel. Now that you’re out of each other’s way, you can wave adieu with a grin. You’ll both roll much bigger snowballs than this one.
Keep the ball moving. If it stops, you might never get it started again. Besides, there’s no more snow where you’re standing.
If you’re lucky, it continues to grow. Bigger than a car. Bigger than a house. Other people will see its glory and join their smaller snowballs into it. They see the inertia and want to be part of the fun. More hands can help when they know where it’s going. But changing course is a whole different story.
When going uphill, everyone needs to agree the hill is worth climbing. When tumbling down, they must work together to guide it swiftly past rocks and trees. There are so many of you now. All pushing together. The path behind you is long. You couldn’t see where you are now from where you started.
It starts to get warm. The ground ahead is full of sticks and leaves. The snow has worn away. Despite all the hands pushing, the snowball starts to shrink. You think there’s a rich field ahead, but you can’t say for sure. The ball is so big now you can’t see around it. It’s easier to see left or right, and it can be tempting to go there instead. Not everyone will stick around to find out.
You’ll have to make a call. Sometimes the right answer is to forge ahead. Try to survive until the next storm. When the fresh powder hits, scoop it up. Survive a few storms and the ball is a mountain that can weather a whole summer. Make it a few summers, and it has its own weather, keeping the warm at bay. Eventually, the tiny clump between your fingers is a moon so big other people roll their own balls across its surface.
Other times the seasons are changing too fast and the snow is retreating everywhere you go. You can’t know for sure which situation you’re in from where you’re standing.
That’s just the mystery of it.
But every morning, there’s the window. There’s the ball. There’s your jacket on the hook.
If you feel the urge, listen to it.
After all, that’s what got you started in the first place.