The poor are wise, more charitable, more kind, more sensitive than we are. In their eyes prison is a tragedy in a man's life, a misfortune, a casuality, something that calls for sympathy in others. They speak of one who is in prison as of one who is 'in trouble' simply. It is the phrase they always use, and the expression has the perfect wisdom of love in it.
Oscar Wilde
The Snowfall
First there was a silence, then the birds began fluttering from tree to tree and then the neighbours started appearing to try and trudge through snow that was knee high and see what they could do about it.
It was the
third day, a Sunday, the sun had come out, the sky was clearing and everybody
set to work after the luxury of a weekend of snow like we had never seen
before.
On the second day, a Saturday, snow lovers in Madrid were able to take out their skis, their snowboards their sleighs even huskies because many people in Madrid are well equipped for the snow. (Spain has a family of Olympic skiing champions who live in a town in the nearby sierra.) Others ploughed through the snow falling clumsily but enjoying every minute.
Instead of visiting the snow in the sierra, the snow had come to visit the city dwellers at a time when there were many restrictions of movement because of COVID, on the weekend after the muted visit of the Reyes Magos. It was a beautiful compensation and indeed it felt like a gift.
On the first day of snow, Friday the 8th young people were out having fun in the snow but that night it was clear that the city would be covered in a blanket of snow. It snowed all night and we had half a metre of snow on Saturday the 9th. The pictures of La Puerta Del Sol looked like a picture by Breughel.
Madrid is also a paradise for birdwatchers.
