My daughter called me at 3am crying so hard I couldn’t understand a single word. All I heard was “Mom… gone… everything’s gone.” Her husband walked out two weeks before Christmas, took half their savings, and left her alone with my 8-month-old granddaughter in a house they could no longer afford.
I drove six hours through a snowstorm to get to them. When I arrived, my daughter was sitting on the kitchen floor, staring at nothing. The baby was crying. The fridge was nearly empty. I held them both and we just cried together for what felt like hours.
The next morning I woke up before dawn, and that’s when I saw it. All that fresh snow in the backyard. I remembered how my own mother used to say, “When life gives you nothing, you create something.” I bundled up little Rosie and carried her outside. My daughter watched from the window, confused, probably thinking I’d lost my mind.
I started building. Not just any snowman, but a snow mama with arms wide open, ready to hold my grandbaby. I ordered silk sunflowers the night before from a small crafter online because I knew fresh flowers wouldn’t survive the cold but I wanted something bright, something that screamed hope in the middle of all that white emptiness. I painted rainbow stripes on her skirt using food coloring because that’s what my mother did for me when I was small and scared and needed magic.
When I placed Rosie in that snow mama’s arms, she laughed. The first real laugh since everything fell apart. My daughter came outside in her slippers, took one look, and collapsed into the snow sobbing. But this time it was different. She kept saying, “She’s smiling, Mom. Look, she’s actually smiling.”
I’ve been staying here three weeks now, making hot cocoa every night and posting Rosie’s pictures in crafty groups online where other grandmas cheer us on. My daughter started sketching again last night. She hasn’t touched her art supplies in two years.
We’re gonna be okay. All of us. Even when men leave and money disappears and the world feels unbearably cold. We build snow mamas and paint rainbows and hold our babies tight. That’s what women do. That’s what love does.
Credit ~ Lilian Herman
