"How do I love thee? Let me count the ways." -Elizabeth Barrett Browning

A good friend of mine and I discovered this poem in high school, and we loved it immediately. It had a perfect beginning, and we loved it for its assumption: "of course I love you, and I love you uniquely, in more than one way." We demonstrated saying it out loud in different tones, from matter-of-fact to dramatic, and perhaps because of this the line is ingrained forever in my mind. At peculiar times, if I think or say I love something, I find myself thinking, "how do I love thee? Let me count the ways." And as I sit to write by a window on a snowy day, the ground already drifted white and the flakes falling thickly from the sky, I can only concentrate for writing about snow, and I cannot help but love it. So "let me count the ways..."

1. For the surprise

Because however furiously it falls, snow always comes silent and stealthily. You might lie in bed and hear the rain pounding on the roof above you, but you can go to bed and wake up to the world turned snowy with no warning at all.

2. For its gracefulness

Everything about snow is graceful, from the way it falls to the way it covers the ground in gentle swells and curves.

3. The way it blends into itself

Have you ever followed a particular snowflake as it fell, and watched it disappear into the background of white? Watching snow fall is a beautiful, seamless experience.

4. The way it makes the world instantly beautiful

Snow covers things. When it is fresh and pristine, snow makes the most decrepit building beautiful, and a muddy stretch of ground lovely.

5. It looks like cream cheese frosting

(If only it tasted like cream cheese frosting)

6. The way it decorates everything it touches

Snow seems to stick to everything - your hat, your coat, your hair, your eyelashes, your house.

7. Its enchantment

This relates to the instant beauty - but a fresh snowfall is not compared to a "wonderland" or "fairyland" for nothing. Snow is the backdrop of stories beautiful and adventurous, from the chilling "Snow Queen" to the Chronicles of Narnia.

8. The way it drapes on branches

Those slivery, skeletal winter branches don't look as if they could hold anything, but snow is tenacious and dresses even naked, winter trees.

9. Adventurous potential

Snowball fights, sledding, igloo building, tunnels...

10. Its versatile beauty

Snow is beautiful when it's falling, beautiful reflecting the sun on a blue sky winter day, and beautiful on a December night when the snow glistens by Christmas light.