” Depending on where you lived when you were younger, snow days were probably a fairly common occurrence. At least if you lived somewhere reasonably close to Northeast Ohio. And they were certainly more ubiquitous than they are now at the University of Akron.”
“

Depending on where you lived when you were younger, snow days were probably a fairly common occurrence. At least if you lived somewhere reasonably close to Northeast Ohio. And they were certainly more ubiquitous than they are now at the University of Akron.

However, this is already a record year for the university. Following two separate and severe snowstorms, we have already had two full snow days (though one of which was a Saturday so it barely counts) and two half snow days. Local school districts have had many more, but it’s easy enough to see why UA would want to continue operations despite heavy snowfall.

Had we been those lucky youngsters in our local schools who get to wake up to their parents telling them just to go back to sleep, we would have yelled, SNOW DAY! and rounded up our friends for snowball fights, sledding, snow-fort building, snow-angel making, etc. It goes without saying that snow days used to be much more exciting when we were kids. It also seems as if, with age, we’ve become more sensitive to the cold. Twenty-something temperatures seem to not phase kids at all; we older folks bundle up and walk quickly to get out of the cold as soon as possible.

For us, now it’s all about using that snow day to catch up on studying and homework, taking care of kids who get to enjoy the day, shoveling driveways and parking lots so you can actually get your car out and spending an hour and a half driving to work when it’s usually a 15 minute comute. A snowball fight sounds much more appealing now, huh?

Of course, the issue of driving becomes a focal point in determining whether or not to cancel classes. Those of you who experienced the bumper-to-bumper standstill on Market Street Friday afternoon surely understand this.

The university doesn’t want to jeopardize the lives of students, faculty and staff by forcing them to drive in dangerous conditions, but it also wants to continue operating normally. We’ll ignore the efforts (or lack thereof) of whatever city’s attempt to plow and salt the roads. As for Akron, with limited resources, they did a pretty good job with the main roads, considering the circumstances. Many side roads, however, have been ignored.

As motorists we simply have to deal with what’s given to us. Some vehicles are better than others in driving in a foot of snow and some people are just better drivers.

For whatever reason, we inevitably see some unfortunate person who has gotten himself stuck, whether it’s attempting to go up a hill, turning onto a snowier side street, spinning out while only trying to go straight or simply not being able to make it out of a parking lot.

It happens. And our first reaction is typically Wow, that sucks, especially if we have to be somewhere by a certain time. And it does suck, considering that person probably had somewhere to be, too.

However, seeing other people stop to help out has not become a completely uncommon occurrence. Despite the emergency vehicles-only driving restriction on Saturday evening, I still saw two motorists stop to help someone else who nearly fishtailed into a telephone pole. A cop was also nice enough to stop.

We need to see more of this behavior because chances are it’s going to happen to you. Wouldn’t it be nice if, immediately after getting your own vehicle stuck, someone stopped to help you just because you did the same thing for someone else the day before?

You may be a few minutes late to work for stopping to help someone. Just tell your boss that you were the one who got stuck, he’ll surely understand, especially if he just got stuck and someone was nice enough to help him.

“