In this 7 minutes, Aaron revisits a very special snowman from his youth
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Story created & performed by: Aaron Calafato
Senior Audio Engineer: Ken Wendt
Additional vocals: Cori Birce
Art: Pete Whitehead
Original Music: thomas j. duke
S3 Episode 14: The Snowman - powered by Happy Scribe
Hey, everybody. It's Aaron. Starting today, and the next three episodes, all Christmas and holiday episodes. Really psyched about this.
I wanted to share today a story I told, I think it was in December of 2020. I titled it appropriately The Snowman for 7 Minute Stories. But it is about an actual short animated film, which I believe started off as a book called The Snowman. This story, which was fictional, ended up actually manifesting in my real life. So I told this story about it.
I had several people, friends of mine, who were asking me, "Hey, should I show this movie, this short animated film, to my kids?" Because I told them we actually do this, we share it with our kids every Christmas Eve. Now, here's the thing. It's a great experience. It's a beautiful, fun film, but there's also some dark and sad moments to it as well, without spoiling it.
Look, before you share this, if you have kids, you're going to have kids, you're an uncle, aunt, mom, dad, whatever your situation, and you want to share this with someone who's younger than, let's say, I don't know, nine, seven, something below that, listen to the story first and then consider it. So you have some context, and then you go from there. So that's why I wanted to share it.
Plus, this little film reminds me so much about my youth and the holidays and Christmas, and the magic of snow and the magic of Christmas. I thought it'd be a great thing, a story to tell to get us started with the holiday season. Okay, enjoy. The Snowman.
It was 1990. I was seven years old, and I'll never forget it. I was standing inside my house, looking at a sliding glass door and looking out onto the first big snow that had fallen that winter the night before. My mom had layered me up. I was like the kid from the Christmas Story. I had so many layers, I could hardly move, but I'd be warm. I remember she just pushed me out that morning.
As soon as the sliding glass door opened, I could remember how it felt, the air when it hit me, and breathing in that cold, clean air. Then the sound of the snow underneath my boots, liking that sound of it crunching every step I took. Then looking out at my backyard and just seeing how wide open it was and beautiful and white, and the reflection of the sun against the glistening snow, and the bare trees in the background that looked like arthritic fingertips pointing to the heavens. Then just the possibility in front of me that day.
As a kid, I had nothing to do except just exist and create as long as I wanted to until the sun came down, and I just intuitively started doing it. It was like built inside of me. I think it's built in every kid. I started creating a snowman. No one told me to do it. I didn't have an agenda item. It just happened.
I remember rolling that first portion, the bottom layer of the snowman, and how long it took me and how hard it was, even when I used the hill for momentum in my backyard. I just pushed and pushed and pushed. It took me almost to lunchtime just to get that bottom portion built.
Even though I was cold, I just had to go to the sliding glass door, had a couple of celery sticks with some peanut butter, and then I had a hot chocolate that my mom got me. That recharged me. I went back out, and I finished the middle portion.
Then after the middle portion, I got the head, and I'm smoothing it out like an artist. Then I get a couple of acorns for the eyes. I get a carrot for the nose. I draw a smiley face, very friendly face. Then I have a hat that my mom gave me, an old hat, and then a scarf. Then I use two broken branches for his arms and then three dark stones for the buttons on the front of his shirt.
I remember just standing back and looking at this snowman I had created, silhouetted against the woods in my backyard. It was like I had created life, except this was like a friend of mine. It was really amazing. Then the next thing I knew the day was over, and I had to go inside for dinner.
So I go inside, I warm up, I eat dinner. Then my mom says I can watch one more show before bed. I find this VHS tape that my grandmother had sent me, and it's titled The Snowman. It's like a cartoon. I thought, "Perfect." This VHS movie was based on a picture book by a guy named Raymond Briggs, except this is a cartoon.
I start the movie, and there's this guy that I have no idea who he is. I later find out it's David Bowie doing a weird intro to this story, a side note. But I keep watching, and then it turns into this cartoon. It was really cool because there was no dialogue. It was just the cartoon with beautiful music. I was just entranced watching this because it was like I was reliving my day.
The kid goes out. He creates a snowman. He makes a friend. Only in this version, as I'm watching, the snowman comes to life and he hangs out with the snowman. The snowman comes into his house, and they get into mischief, and they're having a great time, and they're riding around on motorcycles. Then, even better, the snowman, realizing that time is of the essence, takes this kid and they fly to the North Pole together. They go to North Pole and there's a bunch of other snowman and they're dancing around, having a snowman party.
Then he gets to meet Santa Claus. Santa Claus gives him a gift. Then the snowman flies the kid back home and he says goodbye. It was like the best day of his life. He goes back inside, he goes to sleep, and he's so excited to see the snowman the next day. He wakes up and the sun is coming through in the window. He runs out of bed, and he races to the door, and he opens the door, and the snowman is melted.
I was devastated. He goes out and he's holding the melted snowman in his hands. That's how the story ends. I finished watching this VHS and I'm terrified because I feel like this is going to happen to me. My mom sends me to bed. I can't sleep all night. In fact, I stayed up almost all night worrying that I slept in.
The next morning, my mom wakes me up. Now I'm up, it's nine or 10 o'clock. I can feel that it's warmer. The sun is coming in through the window. I run downstairs to the sliding glass door, and I look into my backyard, and I see my snowman melted. A pile of snow with just a hat and a scarf and a wayward carrot next to it. I was crushed.
In that moment, I felt like I had lost somebody, like a friend or something. For me, it was like a lesson in mortality. But as the winter went on, more snowflakes came. When more snowflakes came, I could build more snowmen. Then it felt like to me that it wasn't so much of a lesson in mortality. But maybe it was a lesson in immortality in the sense that even though this snowman experience was fleeting, it always seemed to come back with the cycle and the change of seasons. That brought me comfort, the magnitude of that.
As I've gotten older, I stopped making snowmen. But just recently, this winter 2020, I saw the first snow come in. It actually came in in November. I ran outside and I called to my kids. I'm like, "Come outside, it's the first snow." I'm just watching these snowflakes fall down and I'm thinking about the potential of all these snowmen we could build. I actually recorded the video, and here was what my daughter said.
Blue, what is it doing?
It's snowing. It's actually snowing, I'm so happy.
It's snowing [inaudible 00:08:30].
I'm so happy.
To see her, to see them experience such utter joy, just joy from the advent of a snowflake falling from the sky. It just took me back to that pure moment, my childhood moment. I got to see it through their eyes. They're not thinking about the snowflakes melting or what's around the corner; they're just in that moment.
I realized right then and there that it's not the snowflakes or the snowmen that change. It's me. It's us. I just can't wait to see what these kids create with this snow this year and the lessons that they might learn from the snowman that they'll build.
7 Minute Stories is created and performed by Aaron Calafato. Our senior audio engineer is Ken Wendt. Our resident artist is Pete Whitehead. Original music by TJ Duke.
If you or your company needs help starting a podcast, Aaron and Ken's company, Valley View, does just that. Reach out to them at valleyview.fm. Special thanks to our partners at Evergreen Podcasts. I'm Cori Birce. Make sure to tune in next week for another story.
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