They’re waiting. Waiting for the first sign of falling snow. And when they come, you will hear the prepubescent screaming from your Hogan suite.

With this season’s first Winter storm just a couple of days behind us, snow stereotypes still surround us. Amara Banks continues the new campus archetype series, Snow Stereotypes, as a MoHi child’s account of the Winter’s return.

After hitting up each floor in your apartment building for candy, Bonnie & Clyde style, in October, your mommy/daddy put away your Asics running shoes in exchange for your LL Bean snow-boots, and your lizard costume in exchange for your snowsuit. The leaf piles ceased to replenish themselves, and the scent of pumpkin spice began to dwindle. However, something is missing. You kind of sensed it around Thanksgiving, but by the time you were obnoxiously yelling with your friends outside that building you think is called Butler, you knew things were very off. There should’ve been tarps on the grass, your breath should’ve been visible, you should’ve been consuming your weight in hot chocolate. Something was missing, and you couldn’t quite put your dirty fingernail on it.

It wasn’t until it happened when you realized it—it hadn’t snowed! Of course it was snow. What else do MoHi kids scream about in the Winter (other than freaking everything)? You waited and waited and waited inside on Saturday, faithfully pestering your parents every hour on the hour: Mommy can we go outside yet? Daddy please I want to go outside!! Each time it was a patient, “No sweetie, we have to wait until Sunday.” But that didn’t stop the question from leaving your mouth again in another 60 minutes, because look outside, dammit!

Sunday is finally here, and you are ready to stretch your vocal cords the furthest they’ve gone all season. You spent so much time inside pissing off your parents that they don’t even care where you go sledding; you & your friends agree on Riverside Park. You bust out of the revolving door and sprint down Broadway with zero regard for anyone taller than you. The risk of spilling coffee, stepping on shoes, or ruining moods fails to cross your mind as you shove your way between adult legs.

Finally, you make it to the slopes. You admire the terrain and shed a tear amongst your friends. A sea whiter than the Iowa Caucus spreads for what seems like miles north and south in front of you. Your dry hands cut your face as you wiped your snotty nose, which is seemingly running faster than most college students running from their responsibilities. Enough of this baby nonsense. You weren’t put on this earth to cry, you were born to yell. It’s time to wake up everyone living on Riverside Drive.

All day, you sled up and down your slopes. It wasn’t Park City, but it was just as good: Riverside Park City. You and your friends shredded every piece of gnar on the strip of land, shrieking all the same until you concluded that you were not in New York City, but instead have entered Gnarnia. As the sun went down, they began to make pathetic complaints: hungry, boo boo on the knee, generally miss Mommy, shit their pants. But it wasn’t until you saw them when you knew it was time to go home. They were way tall, and usually had green or blue or purple hair. They had bad posture and never smiled. You swallowed hard and told your friends, “the smokers are here.” Whenever the college kids came out to the park, and the lamps began to glow a spooky orange color, you knew it was time to return home.

As you loudly asked your friends what they thought of the snow, you made no effort at all to avoid smacking pedestrians in the knees with your obstructive sled. You all agreed that it was a good day, and began to coordinate an after-school snowball fight on those snowy steps next to that statue of a seated woman.