Shoveling Snow

The snowstorm that arrived shortly before Christmas left a legacy of ice that has kept supers in my neighborhood busy. Sometimes they have little helpers. The other day, a mother and her young daughter were hard at work dispatching a light dusting, a gift of afternoon flurries. A biting wind whipped off the nearby Hudson, and the mother worked quickly. The little girl, excited with importance, pranced behind her. The girl, dressed head to toe in pink, used her left hand to scrape the sidewalk with a miniature snow shovel. In her right, she held a pink-sequined handbag. She swung it wide, careful not to dirty it with the work at hand.