Snow
"So, what is this snow?" Mesa inquired. Mesa was a laid back person, whose house I shared in exchange for some house work and gardening. For the most part, he didn't seem to mind having me around. In fact, he claimed that he enjoyed the company and a clean home. I heard from Rose's gossip that the house used to be pretty grimy before I came along. His weed ridden garden that I sometimes helped out with only seemed to further support this claim.
"Snow, hm…, well it's hard to describe. We didn't get a lot of it in the desert," I attempted to explain, "You see it more in much colder climates, further north than where I lived, or higher up in the mountains." I knitted my eyebrows, struggling to describe something that Mesa had no point of reference to. I looked towards the sky, with the crescent moon illuminating everything in a silver glow, and twinkling stars. "That's it!"
"What's it?"
"The stars! Imagine something as pure as a star, soft as cotton, and more delicate than the thinnest sheet of glass. Imagine looking towards the sky and seeing hundreds, no, thousands of star pieces falling from the sky."
"So, they glow?"
"Er… no. But they glitter."
"But if they don't glow, how are they like stars?"
"Well, it kind of looks like they glow, especially when the sun or moon reflects off of them. It makes them sparkle."
"So they do glow."
"Not by themselves. They reflect whatever light hits them."
"So wait, why are they like stars?"
I gave up, proceeding to bury my head into the table. When morning arrived, and Mesa went to bed (his time table isn't exactly normal either), I got out some of my previous writing exercise sheets, ink blotching it in odd places. I also broke into the stores of salt, and retrieved a strange rubber cement like substance that served as glue (harvested from monsters called Chu-Chus).
I set to work, gluing the salt to the paper to make it sparkle, only to find the salt dissolved and failed to give it the sparkly look I wanted. Then I tried sand. Sadly, it made it too brown-ish. Then I tried sand again, only this time using it much more sparingly. A balance gave it the look I sought. I finished this project by ripping the paper into shreds, letting them pile into a bucket. I headed back inside, and sat adjacent to Mesa's bedroom door.
Now all there was left to do was wait…
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And wait…
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And wait…
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And wait…
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Creek. Mesa's door finally opened, revealing a still groggy Mesa. "Finally!" I cried, as I threw the contents of my project just above him, so it swirled around him and creating a small pile on the floor in a very snow like matter, "This is snow, only it's make of water, much more fragile, and melts when you stick your tongue or hand out, or when the sun bothers to melt it if it accumulates. Are there any questions?"
"Wow, it must've been very beautiful," Mesa contemplated with a sigh. I nodded my head, feeling very proud that I managed to show him the beauty of snow. "It's such a shame they only last in one second spurts."
Exasperated, I replied, "Yeah, sure, something like that."