How do you use a sled? Snowy conditions lead to new experiences for a Florida native

The texts from friends and family started to come in Monday.

Have I done any food prep? Do I have heat? Do I know how to scrape my car?

I prepped for Tallahassee’s impending winter storm with the leisurely pace and skepticism of a South Florida native who had made it to 27 years old without ever seeing real snow.

I put together what would be a paltry hurricane kit: the expensive cans of tuna I like, some bread, a fresh jar of peanut butter, tortilla chips, salsa and cookies. Neither Target nor AutoZone carried an ice scraper, which I took as a sign that I’d be fine to just use my library card if I really needed to.

Even as pictures from Tampa Bay Times photographer Luis Santana came in on Tuesday showing snow in Pensacola, and more and more forecasts warned snow was coming for the Capitol, I remained a nonbeliever.

But by 9 p.m. Tuesday, the stairs to my apartment were covered in icy snowfall. There was a thin layer on my car, which I carved “TLH 25” into. I went to bed that night with two thick blankets and the hope that when I woke up it wouldn’t just be slush outside, like some pessimists on the city’s Facebook group were saying.

It wasn’t.

At 7 a.m. Wednesday I ventured out for a walk, gripping the railing to my stairs, which were now packed with hard snow, with both hands. In the just-barely-blue crack of morning light, I could see my whole yard blanketed in white.

Thanks to the sage advice of my friend, Times reporter Lauren Peace, I found an untrodden area, scraped up just a fingernail’s worth of snow and ate it. Lauren warned me that some people will say this is gross, but I’m glad I tried it. (It just tasted like ice.)

Then I left for my walk, feeling bewildered and a little crazed.

I looked that way, too. Unsure of how to dress for such unprecedented weather (it was in the 20s at this point), I pulled on a pair of pink sweatpants over my pajama pants, put a sweatshirt over my long-sleeve shirt and added a thick blue winter jacket on top of that. I tucked my sweatpants into black rain boots and tied a brown plaid scarf around my head like a babushka. It was a warm piece I had sewed with the intent of being able to use it on a chillier day. I never thought it’d see snow.

In the end, I was too warm.

I wandered over to my neighborhood park, enjoying the crunch of snow underfoot, sometimes stomping on an icy bit to see what it would do. As it got later in the morning, a small crowd gathered by a hill where kids sometimes sled down the grass on cardboard boxes.

This morning, it was the real deal. A man who lived in the house across the hill brought out some proper sleds, two long purple ones and a small green one, offering kids and adults alike a turn.

Other families came out with their own makeshift sledding supplies — I saw boogie boards, cardboard boxes and even a cookie tray.

Then it was my turn. I got into the purple sled and asked the man how I was supposed to work it. He pointed me to the best launch spot, where I’d be clear of running into any trees and could maybe even catch a second pickup down a smaller hill.

I pushed off. I don’t know how fast I was moving, but it felt fast. I laughed the whole way down, putting my hand down on the ice at one point to steer away from some people. I understood in that moment why people wear gloves.

By the end of today, the snow will probably be a sludgy mess. But this morning, it was perfect.