There’s something special about waking up on that first real snowy morning of the season. Sure, we may have gotten ours in January, but it still made the early morning curtain-opening feel like Christmas day.
There are several things you can do on the first snowy day of the year. You can go hiking, lay in bed drinking hot cocoa or — if you’re me — you can spend 11 hours at work. Regardless of what you do, going outside for the first time feels like a celebration.
The snow makes everything feel slowed down. Cars travel at half speed and people walk a bit slower trying to find their footing. If you’re lucky enough to see the snow falling in the early morning underneath a street light, you know it elicits a certain “I’m in an indie movie” feeling.
I love the snow. I love everything about it. The crunch underneath my feet, the tingling in my ears when I forget my beanie and bundling up with scarves and gloves has always made me feel like a kid again. To capture how content I feel when I first wake up on a snowy day, I created a playlist titled “for a snowy morning.”
On the playlist, I tried to incorporate songs that give me that childlike, happy feeling in my stomach. I wanted to capture the feeling that always accompanied me when I drank a cup of hot chocolate prepared by my mom as a child after a long day outside, and the one I feel now when I sit surrounded by my friends playing some weird board game one of us found in our apartment. These moments don't last forever though, which is why I sprinkled some sad tunes in the playlist, too.
“Warm Foothills” by alt-J is the most accurate song to capture this feeling. I don’t know if it’s what it is about the slow beginning, or the way the vocals pick up beautifully, but it makes me feel so content my eyes water.
I added “glisten (interlude)” by Jeremy Zucker, simply because it just makes me feel something. I don’t think this song brings me the same contentment as “Warm Foothills,” instead I think it brings a type of uncertainty. It makes me realize that I’m growing up, but it’s so wonderfully made I sometimes don’t realize I feel sad. Another song on the playlist that gives me this same feeling is “take care” by EDEN.
On my snowy morning playlist, you can find my favorite song by Sufjan Stevens, “Wallowa Lake Monster,” a slower song by Harry Styles, “Meet Me in the Hallway” and, for my older music lovers, “Sunday Morning” by The Velvet Underground and Nico.
If you feel the same way I do about snow and music, you know combining them is the best way to spend the first snowfall. And since this one happened long after Christmas, you can use the new Google Home you got as a present to play it.
It’s as simple as opening the curtains to see the streets outside your home and saying, “OK Google, play my ‘for a snowy morning’ playlist.”
