“You sure take a lot of sunrise photos,” the gray-haired woman who used to be drill team captain tells me when I scroll through my iPhone library to show grandchildren photos. No matter how much cake, or punch, or how many balloons, if not for the yearbook senior snapshots on our name tags, I wouldn’t know anyone. Did I even really know them when we graduated together in 1975? Decades of separation reunited. Captain Carry sees my shot of the river iced over, snow frosting the bare trees. “We’re in the winter of our lives,” she proclaims and sips white wine from a plastic cup. “No, this is fall, maybe even Indian summer. Is the phrase ‘Indian summer’ politically incorrect?” Photos flicker almost like a movie until I find the new baby photo. I hold my granddaughter in the chosen frame. Her open baby eyes are locked with mine. I have some knowing glance of adoration that responds to her blank curiosity, almost an unspoken prophecy of love beyond the overlap of mortal time. Yes, the days are getting shorter, but my garden is full—some tomatoes still green, some red and ripe, some rotting on the vine. The boys of summer have finished their pennant race. The World Series is here. Football is robust and populated with Swifties. Anyway, I like winter. I don’t ski. I hate being cold, but when I go back home after this reunion, back north, I will again be transformed into a child when I watch snow fall. Landscapes draped in white-cold sparkle. Leafless, tired vistas brand-new when frozen. She says, “So cute” in response to the grandchild picture and shows me her own shared albums. So goes the evening while the DJ blasts oldies. Tomorrow, I’ll return to retired status. But at this dance I’m suspended in a snow day, some surprise reprieve from the anxiety of exams—the hidden relief from the blizzard of childhood.