Artwork by CHARLIE C.
BY CHARLIE C. I woke up yesterday morning with the towering urge to see how much snow was outside. I lunged out of my bed expecting at least a foot of snow. To my disappointment, I saw an inch. An angry inch. Some snowpocalypse! I saw on the news that we would be hit by a ‘potentially historical’ snowstorm! And we just get this little flurry! Still, I tried to make the most of it for what it was. Within the course of a second (or something like that), all my snow gear was on, and I was ready to go. I flung open the door, and dived right in to it! I decided to make a good ol’ fashioned snowman. Here is a list of things that I have learned while building one:
1. Try not to use powdery snow for it, because once you put the top part on the middle one, both will collapse.
2. If you stick the carrot nose too far in to the head, the head will fall apart.
3. Try to build it away from you dog, because they will bark at it once it is done.
4. If you make a snowman looking in to the window, like he is peeping in, someone most definitely will have a heart attack.
So, I guess if you read between the lines, you could tell that my snowman turned out disastrous. I ended up just going inside for a little bit, but I was rudely interrupted by an invite to my friend Jacob’s house. Because of that, I went, and brought two sleds. Once we arrived, I saw him standing at the doorway with an evil smirk across his face. His left hand was behind his back, and once I saw him, I knew: Snowball fight!
He attacked, and threw a snowball at me. I retaliated and my uncoordinated throws made him laugh, but his made me laugh even harder. I set up a base inside his front yard, and he made one in the back. A couple of minutes of making snowballs went by, until I finally saw him creep over the side of the house. He threw one at me but for an odd reason, sand came out of it. “Did you put sand in this?” I asked. He replied, “Yup.” And that, my friends, was the origin of the sand-ball. Now you know how to make your very own.
Afterwards, we went to the high school next to his house to go sledding on the hills there, and even though I begged him not to, he brought his little ramp. The hill was already long and steep enough. We didn’t need a ramp! Once we arrived, he gave me the ‘honor’ of taking it to the ramp first. I kindly declined, but he insisted I do it. I’m sorry, I just didn’t want to be hurling towards a large wooden object at an outdoor speed! Once I reached the top of the hill, I sat down on my sled, and slightly loosened my grip on the ground below me. And, then I went! Faster and faster, and the ramp was right there. ‘Hi’ I thought to myself. But then, I just realized I would go flying! What was to be afraid of? My nervousness was washed away, and then I finally hit the ramp. I shut my eyes, but when I opened them I saw I was just pushing the ramp down the rest of the hill.
When the sun started to set, Jacob wanted to make a snowman. I tried to get Jacob to believe that it won’t work because all of it was powdery snow. But, not all of it was, so we began. We rolled up all three pieces, and put the head on top. I really did expect it to collapse like my last one did. But, I had to wait and see. Since we didn’t have any coal to use, we used a permanent marker to make the eyes, and an average carrot to make for the nose. Again, there was no coal available, so we aligned three carrots to look like a mouth. Jacob had a hat for his head. Even though there were many patches of dirt that we picked up while rolling around it, and that it was basically the color brown, at that moment, our snowman was perfect. And that was all I needed.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Like any normal 10 year old kid from Haddon Heights, Charlie C. goes to school, loves his dog, likes Minecraft and leaves a mess wherever he goes. He also writes better than most adults and has keen insight into the human psyche that borders on the paranormal. You can check out his blog THE UNIVERSE ACCORDING TO CHARLIE. We’ve hired Charlie to provide Phawker with some much-needed perspective on the world through the eyes of a 10-year-old.