Snow and mauve

It's snowing in Petersburg.

November brings darkness, the rapidly shortening days, and the unreliability of maritime weather: what was snow on one day can be slush tomorrow, or rain and gray. Most of last week in Slovenia we had fog and drizzle, the settled murk of inland Europe in late fall. My friend Rawley assures me that the Slovenian landscape is "heartbreakingly beautiful" - and I believe him, even having seen it in less-than-flattering fashion. The mist holds onto the hillsides in the morning, cloaks the afternoon, scatters briefly above the river for an afternoon of gold, my third autumn so far. Rawley and I joke about where I could go for a fourth, but my flight takes me north, not south. It's raining in Vienna when we land, then overcast but dry when we touch down in Petersburg. It almost feels like coming home, as the cab driver takes me in along Vitebsky Prospekt, along the train tracks that head south of the city toward Pushkin, Pavlovsk and Belarus. On one side of the road there are car dealerships and gas stations; on the other there's a wasteland of track and sidings, warehouses and small metal structures that look like Soviet-era garages. I realize as we drive along how much space these railroads take up, close into the city center. Before I know it we're turning onto ulitsa Marata and Vladimirsky Prospekt. The driver does a U-turn and I'm home.

Tonight though it's snowing, and as I head out at 6:00 to make a quick trip to the grocery store - seltzer, crackers, cereal, smoked salmon - I'm overcome by the curious magic of urban snowfall. I'm unaccountably light-spirited: unaccountably because it's not necessarily a day when the weather would incline toward light spirits. Earlier today the flakes were big and wet, and there's an inch or so of wet snow on the ground, quickly making the sidewalks sloppy. The corners are slushy puddles that have to be jumped over or tip-toed through. Here and there men in bright yellow vests are out shoveling the slush; near the Institute this afternoon I spotted the same kind of sidewalk clearer we have in Auburn, mounted with a scoop on one end and a big rotating brush on the other. When David and I were here in the mid-80's we marveled at the compact Soviet snow-removal equipment, a truck with a plow and conveyor belt that deposits the scooped-up snow in the back to be hauled away. Today's snow doesn't call for such fancy technology. The roads are clear; only the courtyards are coated with snow.

Despite the slush and slipperiness, I'm overcome with the beauty of the evening as I run my quick errand. It's some combination of light, sound, and the energy of the sidewalk as people head home from work or out to evening rendezvous. There is as much life on the street as ever, perhaps even more: women in the ubiquitous high heels and nicely-belted coats with fur trim and smart hats; a young woman with headphones on, smiling to herself as she walks along; two women talk animatedly as they maneuver the puddles; a couple in front of the Dostoevsky hotel taking pictures of the church across the street. The sky is the pale mauve of snowfall at dusk, radiating a new kind of light from all those snowy drops. The bell tower is pale yellow against the greyish mauve; people come in and out of the heavy doors, crossing themselves and bowing before they turn to go. At six the deepest bell in the tower starts to toll, and then is joined by a higher-pitched carillon of smaller bells. Everything radiates light, despite the darkness. The soft yellow of the Vladimirsky sobor, the bits of white falling from the sky, the quiet smile of the woman in her headphones. I pause on the sidewalk to watch the snow, the traffic, the shoppers with their parcels, the traffic as it heads toward Zagorodnyi Prospekt.

It doesn't matter that it's slushy. It's beautiful. All you have to do is see it.