I grew up in Florida. I didn't see proper snow until I moved to Minnesota as an adult, it kinda blew my mind a bit, lol. I had no idea what was meant when people said the snow glistens - pictures can't really capture the effect.
Long ago I was in a Union and every year as a apprentice we had to go to Kansas City to a school. One year there was a guy from Hawaii. First week there came a light snow. A inch, maybe two. We go down for breakfast at the hotel they had us in. We look outside and this huge Samoan is out there barefoot in nothing but cargo shorts dancing around. That guy was out in it every second it was snowing for the rest of the stay. I guess most of us had got that out of our system as kids.
I try to foster that sense of wonder; it's powerful! I've been living in snowy lands for decades now, having grown up in the subtropics. I'm def. not a huge Samoan, so I need some insulation, and with right gear snow time is a blast.
Hell, I'm ohioan and get excited every time I see snow. Lake shadow ain't doing what it used to anymore and I'll admit 1°C rain with 6 hours of sunlight is the worst
I've started watching a YouTube channel of a guy trying to handbuild a homestead in Alaska. I forget where he said he came from, but like you, it was somewhere without snow.
On a recent video, he recorded himself seeing what I think he said was the third snowfall he'd ever seen and the first with accumulation. It was nice to watch his clearly genuine joy and surprise.
I've always loved the snow. I will admit that since it hurt me, I've preferred to enjoy it through a window or from a sheltered place rather than to be in it.
I moved several hundred miles across multiple states in part to be where there's sometimes snow. Shortly after I got here, I was chatting to a local and mentioned that fact; he responded something like "wow. Most people don't move to here for the weather."
edit: I have a bad habit of writing run-on sentences. Tried to fix one here.
It’s truly wonderful, as long as 0C isn’t painful for you.
I’m much better adapted to the cold, so it’s in no way painful (unless I were to pass out in it or try to build a snowman without gloves or something). For me, even German summers are so unpleasantly warm that I can’t eat enough calories without being fully nocturnal. People tend to have a temperature and humidity range that works well for them, and they only adapt to new environments slowly