On the Hill

“Just when I thought you couldn’t get any dumber, you go and do something like this… and totally redeem yourself!” Harry, Dumb and Dumber

This sums up how I felt with respect to one Cornell University yesterday. Let me back up a bit.

I took Ange out to Valentine’s Day dinner a day early on Tuesday night and as we left for the Heights the weather channel was flashing severe weather warnings starting at nine p.m. Our reservations were at seven and as we sat down to eat there was a fluffy, light snow falling. When we left the restaurant at nine a couple of inches had already accumulated and it was snowing much harder.

When I woke up the next morning to walk to class at 7:30 a.m., there was at least a foot on the ground and none of the roads, sidewalks, my front steps, etc. had been cleared. There was a state of emergency warning in effect for Ithaca and a non-emergency travel prohibition for Tompkins County. Yet, Cornell stayed open and I had class (although for professors to get to work it was clearly extremely treacherous travel.) I don’t know why Cornell hasn’t had a snow day since ’93 (since everything, including stores, around us was closed) but I can only assume it is driven by monetary factors…

Alas, when I returned home at nine a.m. I got an amazing email:
“Classes will be cancelled from 12 p.m. on today.”

What proceeded to take place was nothing short of legendary – Cook St. turned into the place to be and about 50 people gathered at the top of the street to sled down. People came with real snow boards, people came on skis; they even built a massive jump. I saw a skier attempt a back flip and land on his head. Four of us tried to sled down on a mattress, if only our stupid landlord provided us with slicker mattresses it might have worked. Later in the day we took Jason’s SUV out and attempted to drive down Buffalo St. to get some food at Wegman’s. We did make it, but spun out quite a few times; it was definitely scary.

It really was a reenactment of every snow day from our childhood and each Cornell student was trying to relive that one last time. What a fun day, and definitely one I will remember forever.