Snowpocalypse

I really didn’t want to go out. DC had been pounded by snow – heavy snow – for a couple of days and the city was completely shut down. I had planned ahead and was firmly ensconced in my well-stocked apartment and as long as the internet and power held out, I really didn’t have any reason to leave. Except. Well, the snow had stopped falling but – since it had been a heavy, wet snow it had that sort of picturesque quality in the way it coated everything – especially in the way it piled up delicately on the branches of the trees. It’s an awesome thing but a quality not normally associated with our dry, windblown Midwestern snows. Even in DC, I knew this would be a transitory phenomenon – as soon as the snow dried out a little, or the wind picked up or the sun came out, the snow would get knocked down and this quality would be lost and the picturesque would turn into yet another dreary winter. So basically, I felt an obligation to go out and shoot. Isn’t that what photographers are supposed to do?

I strapped on my Army Issued insulated boots and threw on a pair of North Face snowboarding pants (purchased years ago for a snowboarding trip which never happened) – I had been lugging them and the boots around for years in the thought that ‘maybe they’d come in handy some day’. Thanks to Snowpocalypse 2010, I’m probably doomed to lug them around for another decade or so. I grabbed my gear and proceeded to stumble my way across DC in knee deep snow. There had been no plowing of any sort so going was slow. I had made it to the Marine Corps Monument, shooting all the way, but clearly any sort of long distance move was out. Still, I was pretty close to the Key Bridge, the C&O Canal and Georgetown. Since I had shot these areas before in other weather, it seemed like a safe bet. And sure enough, it was.
Once again however this shot proves I have no idea what’s popular as this thing took off once I posted it. It seems that there’s a large subset of DC area residents who: 1. Like snow covered shots of Georgetown and 2. Don’t want to take them themselves.

They missed out.