14 Dec Mad Max: Flurry Road
Ah snow days! As a student, I cherished them. As a teacher, I begged for them. Now, as the Artist Formerly Known as Teacher, I decide when to take a snow day. And as a rational and responsible adult I hereby declare today a snow day. As I sit in my cozy nook scrolling through Facebook posts, I take note of the average two- hour morning commutes and road closures funneling these brave road warriors onto increasingly diminishing roadways.
In the midst of this automotive apocalypse emerges the yellow menace. School buses packed with screaming, careening youth that make George Miller’s war boys look like the Vienna Boys’ Choir. Yet school districts insist on dispatching these war rigs onto already chaotic and dangerous roadways. Granted, most bus drivers could give the Road Warrior a lesson in post-apocalyptic driving conditions. Put Max Rockatansky behind the wheel of one of these child transport vehicles and he’d flip-spin it off the nearest cliff.
But child safety is not my main gripe with Utah’s refusal to declare a snow day. Indeed, most districts pride themselves on their accident-free records. No the true threat to our children is the horrors of a childhood devoid of the joys of a snow day. One district even prides itself on having gone six decades without a snow day! That is three generations of deprived children. There are consequences for this level of neglect. Where would architecture be without the training gained from building snow forts? And yes folks, it takes a good 8 hours to build a truly palatial snow fort. Would we have the world’s strongest military without the marksmanship garnered from neighborhood snow ball fights? What of our calligraphers? Would your wedding invitations have been as elegant had these artists not perfected their dexterity by writing their names in the snow? And now with the invention of the female urination device (which I have nicknamed the weenis) girls too can enjoy this right of passage. Score one for feminism!
Yes, it is time to do right by our children. It is time to demand a snow day. Don’t our children deserve a day of unsupervised mayhem? Besides, it sure would help clear up the roads.
Thanks to Shannon Barnson for his commentary on Utah’s traffic update.