By March 2038. Spring practice has started and for the first time in twenty-one years I'm not running it. I'm there — Berardi asked me to stay through the end of the school year as a consultant, and I've agreed because David needs the transition support and because walking away completely in January would have been like leaving a surgery half-finished. But I'm not in charge. I stand on the edge of the field and watch David work and I keep my mouth shut.
This is the discipline of succession: staying present without imposing. David doesn't need my commentary on every decision. He needs the players to see me trusting him. So I stand back. When he asks for my read, I give it honestly. When he doesn't ask, I hold it. This is harder than it sounds. Twenty-one years of having opinions about everything that happens on this field, and now I'm watching a play I'd have called differently and I'm silent. I go home and I tell Lisa instead. She says: that sounds like progress. I say: it's miserable progress. She says: those are the best kind.
Elena's third book came out this month. Short fiction, longer than the first two collections, nominated for a thing I don't fully understand but that her publisher seems very excited about. She read at a venue in Albuquerque and I watched the livestream on my laptop in the kitchen. She reads her own work with the same cadence she's always talked — direct, precise, slightly faster than you expect. Two hundred people in that room and none of them knew I was watching from a Denver kitchen eating sopapillas. I was crying by the second story. I always cry when Elena reads. She doesn't know. I'm telling her when I see her next month.
That night in the kitchen — laptop open, Elena’s voice coming through the speakers, sopapillas going cold on the plate because I forgot to eat them — I kept thinking about how the best things are made from almost nothing. Snow ice cream came to mind later, after I’d closed the browser and wiped my face and stood at the window watching the last of the March snow on the backyard. It’s the kind of recipe that asks you to pay attention to what’s right in front of you, to work with what the moment has given you rather than what you wish you had. That felt exactly right.
Snow Ice Cream
Prep Time: 5 minutes | Cook Time: 0 minutes | Total Time: 5 minutes | Servings: 4
Ingredients
- 8 cups fresh, clean snow (packed loosely)
- 1 cup whole milk or half-and-half
- 1/3 cup granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- Pinch of salt
Instructions
- Gather the snow. Collect clean, freshly fallen snow from an uncontaminated surface — avoid snow near roads or that has been sitting for more than a few hours. Measure out approximately 8 cups into a large chilled bowl and place it back in the freezer while you prepare the base.
- Mix the base. In a separate bowl or large measuring cup, whisk together the milk, sugar, vanilla extract, and pinch of salt until the sugar is fully dissolved, about 1–2 minutes.
- Combine. Pour the milk mixture over the snow a little at a time, stirring gently with a large spoon or spatula after each addition. Stop adding liquid when the mixture reaches a soft, scoopable ice cream consistency — you may not need all of it depending on how packed your snow is.
- Taste and adjust. Taste the mixture and add a touch more sugar or vanilla if desired. Work quickly, as the snow will begin to melt.
- Serve immediately. Scoop into bowls and serve right away. Snow ice cream does not keep — this is a recipe for the moment you’re in.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 110 | Protein: 2g | Fat: 3g | Carbs: 19g | Fiber: 0g | Sodium: 55mg