mattacme

I don't remember the date, but it was winter of 95-96 I think. It was a Sunday night and I had been hanging out at the Grog in Newburyport with one of the waitresses and the rest of the floor staff. They had a so called blues show every Sunday night down in the basement where the stage is and as usual we would sit smoking cigarettes and sipping a drink while watching the loners and the pairings leave the blues show. We called it the parade. Closing time rolls around and a pretty large group of us head around the corner to the Thirsty Whale for a drink. There is a pretty good snowstorm outside but its not super cold or windy. We have a few at the Whale, then most of us decide to head over to my place to sit around in front of the fireplace (I had a nearly walk in fireplace) and drink some more and smoke more butts. On the way there somebody throws a snowball at somebody else and then the great Newburyport snowball massacre begins.

Its not such a common sight to see a group of maybe fifteen adults, ranging in age from 24 to 50, running around the streets like a bunch of kids throwing snowballs in the middle of the night. The melee actually grows when a cop we know and like comes upon us in his patrol car, steps out, removes his gunbelt and joins in. There's lots of snow, and it packs easily but not too densely. Perfect snowball snow. Someone gets someone in the earhole, someone else escalates the hostilities by raising a big chunk of plow berm and crashing it over their victim's head, its just mayhem. Great times. The snowball fight winds down, but not the laughter or the smiling. We head over to my old place and enjoy the fire, and the drinks, and the butts, and each other.

There is not a lot I miss about winter in New England, but I sure miss that.