Bernie Taupin’s first and only ever, self-titled 1971 spoken word album. All winter in Providence, I sift through my father’s music. He handed them over, reminding me once more that he gave up a gig with David Bowie back in the 80’s because I was about to be born–a story I’ve heard an extraneous number of times–and that what he’s giving me is quality shit. When he took me to the airport last summer, on my way to leave Mississippi to live in the cold, cruel north, he gave me a stack of cds as a parting gift. It’s what I’ve inherited from my classically-trained pianist father that I burrow into. *** In Rhode Island, it’s not my mother’s quilting or knitting that I turn to when I need desperately to feel anchored–though I borrowed the cigs thing. Winter in Rhode Island doesn’t give a fuck.

Like, shouldn’t we all be in the South right now? I’m thinking this as the wind whips blankets of snow at my body, whistling as it does. I can’t help but notice how out of place we seem. Today, three seabirds flap at each other, squawking furiously over discarded pizza crusts. It’s my free period and I’m standing in the open lot across from my school where I come to chain smoke Marlboros to soothe my nerves. My mom did all three.īut this is a real snowflake, and this is my first winter in Rhode Island, where I’ve come to teach English at an inner city high school in Providence. Not unlike quilting or knitting or smoking bogies. A subtle response to crisis–to things that made us feel helpless, like inclement weather. But cutting snowflakes was more than just southern escapist origami, it was, in fact, a common thing we did beneath tables during tornadoes or torrential downpours of rain and hail.

We would fold crisp sheets of white paper into rectangles and cut triangles into the sides. It’s a Monday in February, and I see a snowflake so big it reminds me of the fake ones we used to make in my fourth grade art class in rural Mississippi. By Alex Ashford Winter in Rhode Island doesn’t give a fuck if this is your first New England winter and you’re a southerner who (admittedly) can’t fucking deal.

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