Snow Day For Home Schoolers

So we start another day
of school at home,
the boys all bleary-eyed,
morose and slow
with newly-eaten breakfast,
me half-asleep,
fingers warming
on my mug of steaming tea,
the small ceramic heater
whining softly
in the cold front sunroom
that is our classroom,
the chairs marched in from
the dining room
as forlorn
as the boys are,
after Christmas and New Year.

Algebra and geometry,
spanish and biology,
reading, writing,
civics and geography
all ready,
notebooks and lessons
piled neatly
under "Treasure Island",
pirate tales now three-quarters read;
the boys trudge in, faces solemn,
they sign attendance sheets
and with daily bored routine
haul up the blinds across the windows
lined up facing the street outside -

and everything is white,
everything is quiet,
cold softness of a winter storm
blown in overnight,
the maples bowed with heavy snow,
frozen drifts piled high across the road
and large flakes still swirling down,
sparkling from skies of faded gray...

I turn back to my sons
and see delight
where before was only resignation,
I see snowball fights instead of math,
angel imprints in the snow
instead of written words on paper,
steaming breath on icy air
instead of fungi anatomy,
excitement overcoming learning:
they look at me,
I look out at the world turned white
and promising...
"To hell with it, let's have a snow day..."

...and maybe
I say
to myself
as we pile into the car
just maybe
I can teach them physics
as they sled -
- acceleration,
equations,
gravity,
friction and velocity...

...who am I kidding?