White to Move Supplied by Chess.com

Chess

Supplied by Chess.Com

White to move. Can you see how he can win material?

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Snow Day

by Chantal Bellehumeur

Snow days are not just for children, thought Olivia as she walked back home from her little winter adventure.

Like most mornings recently, the thirty eight year old woman had struggled to get out of bed that day. It had taken her a lot of effort to lift her head from her down pillow and leave the comfort of her warm queen sized bed to start her latest daily routine; force herself to do some basic stretches, water all the plants in her apartment while talking to them, have a short one way conversation with her two pet goldfish as she feeds them, eat a light healthy breakfast, brush and floss her perfect teeth, take a shower, braid her shoulder length brown hair rather than taking the time to dry it, and get dressed. Olivia lacked the energy to go out, feeling fatigued despite having gone to bed early and sleeping in. However, her family doctor had ordered her to take a walk every day to get some fresh air and exercise so she'd been pushing herself to do so for the past week; since being on medical leave from the office due to stress. It had done her a lot of good so far. She always felt refreshed and slightly more awake afterwards. It also helped her get her mind off things which put her in a better mood. Normally, Olivia didn't care much for the winter season. However, there was something about this morning's heavy snowfall that made her smile when she looked out of the large horizontal window in the kitchen of her second-floor corner unit apartment. The rooftops and ground were already completely covered in white fluff, and she wondered if it was the kind of snow that instantly fell apart when picked up or stuck together easily. Olivia also wondered if some of the schools would be closed even though it would not affect her. She watched as a few of her neighbours laboriously dug out their parked cars from the street below with heavy duty shovels and removed the accumulated snow from their vehicle windows with their long snow brushes. She heard a few faint French curses and it made her laugh. Olivia was glad not to have to deal with that kind of mess.

As Olivia continued curiously spying, two young children in snowsuits ran by screaming and laughing. They were playfully throwing snowballs at each other. The amusing sight made Olivia feel nostalgic, remembering the good times she had playing in the snow with her younger sister and many friends as a child. It made her want to go back to those carefree days.

Olivia decided to make herself a hot chocolate for her morning walk, with a special destination in mind, and poured the liquid as well as several mini marshmallows in her metallic travel mug. She then took out her sporty winter gear from the front hall closet and bundled up.

"I can do this," she encouraged herself right before opening the front door of her apartment. Some days were harder than others to actually leave so she had to push herself harder. Little pep talks helped. Today, she realised that she was just doing it out of habit rather than necessity.

As Olivia reached the small lobby of her four-story apartment building, she could see her friendly superintendent shoveling the wide walkway for what she guessed might be the second or third time that morning. She gently pushed the glass door open to go outside, and as she passed her superintendent she gave him a polite wave to say hi. He waved back and wished her a good day.

Olivia already felt like it would be a good day; an excellent one in fact. The weather was really nice and not too cold; only -1 degrees Celsius according to the Montreal weather report, with no chilly winds blowing.

The sidewalk plow had not passed yet, so Olivia had to walk in approximately two feet of accumulated snow. Luckily, a few other people had already ventured on the hidden sidewalk so she was able to step into their deep footprints which made things slightly easier. She still broke a sweat as she struggled to make her way to the nearby municipal park, only being able to walk normally during the three times she had streets to cross. They had each been fully plowed, although the snow had already started accumulating again. At the end of each sidewalk Olivia came to, she had to use more physical effort to walk over the short banks of thick snow the plows had created during their street clearing. She was getting a good workout.

Starting to feel too warm, Olivia flipped off the thick hood of her short black cotton jacket plus removed her black knitted woolen scarf from around her neck and continued on her way.

It took Olivia over fifteen minutes rather than the usual ten to get to the five acre park which appeared deserted. She trudged her way deeper inside, making a big effort to create a decent path through the accumulated snow for anyone else that might want to venture in the park and also to facilitate her way back. She noticed a few rabbit and squirrel footprints on the surface of the snow along the way.

Olivia eventually plopped herself down on a wooden bench under some tall pine trees. The bench itself barely had any snow on it because of the semi shelter the abundant and full pine branches provided, but shortly after sitting down Olivia felt a heavy layer of snow fall onto her head. It appeared that a squirrel which had jumped on one of the snowcovered pine branches had been the cause, and it made Olivia laugh.

"Thanks buddy!" she told the fluffy little brown animal with a bushy tail. It stared back at her with its black beady eyes and made a strange noise with its mouth as though in response to her sarcastic comment. "No, I don't have any nuts for you," Olivia added. The squirrel jumped onto another branch, making more snow fall on Olivia, and innocently made its way further up the pine tree. That gave Olivia an idea.

After wiping all the snow from her black knitted woolen tuque and putting it back on her head, Olivia got up from the bench and started searching for

the perfect climbing tree. She soon spotted a large pine with thick branches going all around its fat brown trunk. She grabbed hold of one of the uneven branches with both hands, and set her right foot on another. Olivia carefully made her way up to the middle of the conifer then had to stop because she could no longer fit into the crowded space. She would have liked to get a good view of the park grounds, but there were too many branches and prickly pine needles in her way.

When Olivia was ready to go back down, she carefully began her slow descent. She felt a temporary moment of panic since maneuvering her way to the bottom of the pine tree proved to be harder than her climb and she almost lost her grip. Closer to the ground, she simply jumped right into the snow. She felt too lazy to get up just yet, so she stayed put even though she wanted a sip of the hot chocolate she had abandoned on the bench. Remembering that she had brought a small bag of unshelled sunflower seeds with her as a snack, Olivia took them out of her coat pocket and removed her thick black gloves. As she sat cross legged in the snow eating the unsalted seeds, she noticed a few black-capped chickadees gathering near her on the pine tree branches and snowy ground. Olivia put some of the seeds in her bare right hand and extended her arm to see if the birds would come eat them. To her contentment, one of the chickadees flew up to her and lightly landed on the side of her hand. It moved its tiny head a few times, then picked up one of the seeds with its pointy black beak and quickly flew away. Then came another black and white bird, and then another... The feathered beings took turns picking seeds from Olivia's hand.

When all the exposed sunflower seeds had been taken, Olivia grabbed another handful from her bag and the birds continued coming to her in turns. Some of them temporarily landed on her arms, legs, or head. A few squirrels with brown or gray coloured fur had started gathering around her now too. They stood on their hind legs with their tiny arms in front of their white furry chest, cutely looking at her. Olivia kind of felt like a modern princess in a fairy tale and fought her sudden urge to start singing.

"Oh! What the heck!" she finally exclaimed to herself. With nobody around to hear her, Olivia confidently let out a few random musical notes with her voice. It sounded terrible, but made her feel surprisingly liberated and more alive.

Her bad vocalisation had temporarily scared off some of the birds, but it didn't take long for them to start flying back to her.

Olivia continued sharing her snack with the chickadees and even threw some of the seeds towards the onlooking squirrels. One of them bravely came closer to her and touched her leg. When Olivia lowered her hand towards it, the squirrel gently took a

seed and started eating it, completely unafraid. It signaled for more by lightly touching Olivia’s leg again every time it was done eating. When her bag was empty, Olivia returned to the bench and finally took a sip of her hot chocolate. Her animal friends gradually left her company. Olivia sat in silence for a moment. She held onto her mug of hot chocolate with her gloved hands and observed the beautiful winter scenery in front of her. There were several types of trees and shrubs on the short hills of the heavenly park, with their branches all covered with sparkling snow.

The narrow foot trail plus double bicycle path circling the large semi frozen duck pond in the centre of the park could not be seen, but Olivia knew where they were because of all the black Victorian style light posts that lined the sides. The electric lights were never lit during the day, but gave off a nice romantic shimmer at night. It provided good ambiance when the pond was frozen enough to skate on.

Since it wasn't safe to go skating yet, Olivia considered suggesting to her husband that they go for an evening stroll in the park later on if the weather was just as nice. They were due for some quality time together outside their home. Hopefully, the foot trail would be cleared by then since they did not own any snowshoes. Olivia allowed her mind to continue wandering. Perhaps she and her husband could make it a date night by extending their walk to one of the nearby cafes for a special dessert coffee; one with whipped cream, caramel syrup, and chocolate sprinkles.

Olivia thought they could treat themselves to some baked goods too, such as a red velvet cupcake, a piece of cheery cheese cake, crème brûlé, a millefeuille pastry, or even a giant oatmeal chocolate chip cookie. She always had trouble deciding what to order at cafes or bakeries because everything in the display cases always looked so delicious.

All that sudden daydreaming about food was making Olivia hungry, and she somewhat regretted giving away so many of her sunflower seeds. She had to admit though, her experience feeding the birds and squirrels had been quite special.

Even though she was already feeling completely Zen thanks to the tranquility of her surroundings as well as the positive thoughts running through her mind, Olivia closed her eyes and began doing some breathing exercises. She slowly breathed in through her nose, held it for two seconds, then exhaled just as slowly through her mouth the way her new psychologist had taught her to do during her first therapy session. The sweet smell of the pine needles along with the refreshing scent of the cold winter air filled her nostrils. It was nice to fully relax without having to worry about anything.

Olivia had been strictly instructed by both her doctor and psychologist to use her given time off to do things for herself. Normally, she would feel slightly guilty for not being productive, but she realised that she needed to take care of her mental health in order to be functional.

Before going on medical leave, she was having trouble sleeping at night and always felt tired in the morning. At her place of work, she often experienced massive headaches, stomach pain, rapid

heart palpitations, difficulty breathing, nausea, and dizzy spells.

One afternoon, the small stuffy windowless office Olivia shared with two other female colleagues was spinning so much she felt the need to go hide in the women's bathroom. She thought she might throw up, so she crouched on the hard tile floor in one of the metal stalls with her head close to the porcelain toilet bowl but nothing came out. She eventually rested her head against the flat smudgy wall, to avoid having her face come into contact with the unsanitized seat, and closed her eyes.

Olivia didn't realise how long she had been in the bathroom until one of her colleagues came to check up on her.

"Are you okay?" Olivia heard Mellissa calling to her not make herself invisible like she wished so simply had to do her best to ignore the prying eyes.at the time. "You're been in here for over an hour." Unfortunately, Olivia still felt really nauseous and dizzy. She faintly told Melissa as much as she slowly opened up her tired eyes. The fluorescent lights from the high ceiling were too bright and made her feel worse, so she closed them again. Her body felt hot one second so she took off her black cashmere blazer, and frozen the next so she put it right back on over her fancy white blouse. Olivia realised she was trembling and once more thought she might throw up but nothing came out. her despite her soft voice and good intentions made her more nauseous. Olivia naturally wanted to feel better again but didn't know how to make that happen. She felt completely helpless and slightly embarrassed about her predicament.

Melissa eventually suggested Olivia drink some water and left the bathroom to go get some for her.

Olivia could not bring herself to move, let alone stand up in order to open up the locked stall door, so Melissa cleverly used her plastic access card to pick the metal lock from the outside and squeezed her way in. Olivia managed to drink some of the cold water given to her in a recyclable paper cup, realising she was very dehydrated.

Although she did not have a fever, Olivia's forehead felt a bit warm so she splashed a bit of the leftover water on it with her fingers which felt nice. Melissa considerately offered to drive Olivia home even though the workday was nowhere near finished. It was a big challenge for Olivia to get up and start walking, especially in her uncomfortable high heel shoes. But, with Melissa's help and patience she slowly managed to get back to her desk to collect her personal belongings and make her way to the outdoor parking lot. She got a few questioning looks along the way, but unfortunately she could not make herself invisible like she wished so simply had to do her best to ignore the prying eyes.

Once inside her car, Melissa punched Olivia's home address into her GPS. They arrived at their destination in roughly twenty minutes. It would have taken Olivia almost an hour to get home had she taken public transport as usual, although she wasn't sure how she possibly would have managed in her debilitating condition. She was extremely grateful for the lift and also appreciated Melissa making sure she got inside her apartment alright.

Thinking made her head throb, she could barely find the energy to speak, and hearing Melissa talking to Although Melissa didn't really want to leave Olivia by herself, Olivia convinced her worried colleague

that she would be okay after lying down in her bed for some proper rest. Her teenaged son would be back from school soon and her husband would be home from work by dinnertime, so she would not be alone for long.

go see the psychologist at his home office twice a week for discussions and learn how to manage her anxiety. Although she was open to taking anxiety medication if her doctor deemed it necessary, she wanted to try getting better naturally first.

Olivia took the following day off to get additional rest and made an emergency appointment with her doctor. He was able to see her the day after, and that's when he assessed that all her physical symptoms were due to stress and anxiety. Olivia could not believe that her body would react that way because of work, yet it made perfect sense. There had been so many changes at the office lately as well as tighter deadlines. Her workload as an administrative assistant kept increasing which made her feel overwhelmed all the time. She rarely took her entitled breaks any more, not even for lunch which she mostly just ate at her desk while working. She barely even sipped the coffee or tea she made herself in the office kitchen each morning because she got so busy and ended up forgetting about her beverage. Some evenings, she worked overtime to make up for the valuable time she lost having to attend what she considered to be pointless meetings. Some of that overtime was often done at home since she had access to her work emails on the company cell phone she was given, and could not help herself from checking them regularly. It was like an addiction. Even when she had gone on vacation down South with her family a few months back she had taken some of her work with her because she was still expected to take care of urgent matters. Olivia was put on medical leave for two weeks, and had a follow up appointment with her doctor to be re-evaluated. She was also recommended a psychologist whom she made an appointment with as soon as she got home that day. The therapy sessions were not cheap, but at least the high fees would be partially covered by her group insurance. Regardless, Olivia understood that they were necessary for her healing process. He plan was for her to As she sat on the park bench, now taking another sip of her hot chocolate, Olivia thought about some of the many important things her psychologist had already told her. His soothing voice echoed in her head. "Remember to take deep breaths, go for walks, enjoy yourself. Do things that make you happy." Olivia had started writing in a journal, as recommended by her psychologist. Inside, she listed all the things that made her happy. She mentally looked back on her childhood memories, a time in her life when it didn't take much to keep her content, and started there; playing, building a fort, ice skating, tobogganing, tubing down ski hills, building a snowman, and making snow angels was part of her happiness list.

She decided to relive part of her childhood right then and there.

After taking a few more sips of her hot chocolate, Olivia placed her mug on the bench and got up. She then took a few steps forward, turned around, and allowed herself to fall backwards onto the thick pile of snow. Staring up at the blue snowy sky, she moved her arms up and down the side of

her head plus her legs out and in from her body as though she were doing jumping jacks to form a snow angel. She took a few deep breaths through her nose while thick snowflakes fell on her cold face before clumsily getting up to observe her masterpiece.

"Beautiful," she said out loud even though it looked exactly the same as all the other snow angels she had ever made; except for the size of course. This one was obviously bigger than any of the ones she had made as a child, but it was nothing to brag about. She got over it fast and moved on.

Next, Olivia gathered some sticky snow together to form a ball and started rolling it until she was satisfied with the size. She then rolled a slightly smaller snowball and placed it on top of her first, and an even smaller one on top of that. The snowman she built was about half her height; around two feet and six inches tall. Olivia looked around for items that could compliment her new creation. Under a tall naked tree, she found a couple of thin broken branches which she used as arms. She took a long green pine needle from another fallen branch to form a smiling mouth, two acorns to make eyes, and pushed in three small pinecones about two inches from each other in a vertical line on the top part of the body to look like buttons. The final touch was temporarily adding her black woolen scarf around the snowman's thin neck.

"Hello Bob," Olivia said out loud to the happy looking snowman. It was the name she and her sister always used when they didn't feel like putting in too much effort into naming something. "No. I can do better," thought Olivia. "You look like a...Peter. No. Jackson." She struggled with a few other male names, remembering why Bob usually became the default choice, then finally settled for Frank. Deciding that Frank needed a companion, Olivia made another snowman around the same size and named it Joanna. It was the first female name that popped into her head and she just stuck with it. She then made two smaller snowmen to make it look like Frank and Joanna had children. "They are twins called Collette and Michael," she said to herself matter-of-factly; two more names her mind came up with at random.

Olivia took out her personal cell phone from her coat pocket to take a picture of Frank and his happy looking snow family, realising how nice it was not to be

carrying her work phone with her to check numerous emails or voice messages. She had managed to truly disconnect from the office and was very proud of herself.

After taking a funny selfie with the four smiling snowmen and posting it on her Facebook page even though it would probably end up embarrassing her son, Olivia put her cell phone away and went back to her hot chocolate.

When she was done with her drink, Olivia decided to walk up one of the small snowy hills and roll down like a log. It wasn't as fun as she remembered it to be and definitely not as exciting as sledding or tubing. In fact, she almost broke her fragile fogged up eyeglasses in the process and the fast descent made her a bit dizzy so she didn't do it again. She simply got up to brush off all the snow from her jacket and matching snow pants which proved to be pointless in the end.

After a moment of rest, Olivia chose to build a small snow fort close to her snowmen. Moving around on her hands and knees like a baby, she rolled up several large boulders to form the roundish base, then started stacking some more on top and smoothing the walls together. Using her gloved hands, she dug out the majority of the snow from the middle of the three foot tall fort then laid down comfortably inside on her aching back. She was now exhausted and warm from all that hard work, and ready for a nap.

As she remained lying on her back in the snow with her eyes closed, allowing thick snowflakes to fall on her face again, Olivia listened to the peaceful sound of the chirping birds. She could also hear vehicles rolling by on the nearby street and the occasional sirens, but did her best to tune them out.

Her short spontaneous meditation session was suddenly interrupted by the loud sound of a barking dog instantly followed by the feeling of something wet on her right cheek. Startled, her eyes quickly opened and she saw her friend Samantha's black Labrador-Retriever named Biscuit practically on top of her. He was happily wagging his cute little tail and licking her face as a form of greeting and show of affection. Samantha was holding the end of the seven month old puppy's leather leash a few feet away, laughing. "I'm glad it's actually you," Samantha confessed. "It would have been pretty embarrassing if I had just let Biscuit lick a complete stranger's face." Both women laughed at the thought.

Before Samantha had the chance to question Olivia about the fort she was just found in or the snowmen, she quickly sat up to make a snowball and threw it at her forty three year old friend. It hit her right in the chest but didn't seem to bother Samantha in the least.

Samantha tried to hit Olivia back with a fresh snowball of her own, but somehow missed despite the close proximity. Olivia stood up and managed to hit her friend one more time with a new snowball before running out of the fort laughing. She didn't get far before feeling a snowball hit her hard in the middle of her back. "Ow!" she dramatically yelled out even though she could bear the minor pain that only lasted half a second. Samantha told her to stop acting like a baby. The two grown women continued playfully throwing snowballs at each other in rapid succession for a good five minutes, with Biscuit excitedly prancing back and forth in the snow from Olivia to Samantha. They stopped the snowball fight when they both became out of breath. At this point, the hyper puppy still wanted to play but seemed content with trying to get Frank's attention.

Biscuit stole one of the branch arms with his jaw, and brought it over to Samantha. She threw it as far away as she could for Biscuit to go fetch. Olivia found it amusing to see the puppy partially vanish into the untouched snow and move forward with agitated determination to collect the sunken branch. All she could see was the top of his fluffy little black head as well as his thin wagging tail. "I haven't had this much fun in ages!" Olivia announced when she and her friend sat down on the bench to rest. Samantha confessed that she could not remember the last time she had thrown a snowball at somebody, and that their little war had been a blast. "Much more entertaining than my usual walk around the park that's for sure," she joyfully added. "And to think I almost avoided the park today." Samantha explained that she had chosen to walk in the park despite the heavy snow because of the cleared passage she had seen which looked slightly easier to walk in than the unplowed sidewalk.

Biscuit came back with the branch and gave it to Olivia to throw this time. She was more than happy to do so. When the puppy came back with it, Olivia gave him one of the chewy bones shaped dog treats she had taken the habit of carrying with her because of her occasional run-ins with Samantha and Biscuit. Of course, the puppy had to earn his treat first, so she made him give her his right paw.

Samantha could not keep Olivia company for much longer because she had to get back to her full house to remotely log into her office computer; she was working from home today, and her three kids were off from school. Samantha presumed they were probably fighting with each other by now. As Samantha got up from the bench, she promised Olivia to get in touch soon for a leisure walk with her and Biscuit or some tea and cookies at home. Olivia took her scarf back from Frank and walked with Samantha part of the way home, on a newly plowed sidewalk, during which she briefed her friend on her current situation. They had not talked in a while because of their busy lives.

"I wish I had time to play around," Samantha said as the two women were about to part ways at the streetlights. "I feel like all I do is work, make dinner, help the kids with their homework, do housework, and run errands. I barely ever have time to myself anymore unless you count walking the dog." Olivia sympathised with her friend and reminded her to make time for herself. "It's important," she emphasised. "Don't be like me and wait until you burn out." Samantha thanked Olivia for her good advice and crossed the street with Biscuit who had decided to bring the toy branch home with him. Olivia crossed on the other side when her light turned green, and made her way back home with almost as much effort as she had walking to the park. She hung her damp clothing on a fold out rack to dry, then took a relaxing lavender scented bubble bath by candlelight.

After drying herself off, Olivia got into her comfortable cotton beige pajamas and matching fluffy slippers. She turned on the electric fireplace and got cozy on the living room couch under a soft thin blanket to read a few chapters of a historical romance novel from the public library before eating a late lunch.

After a simple but comforting bowl of tomato soup with melted cheddar cheese as well as a few salted soda crackers, Olivia got properly dressed again in jeans plus a black t-shirt and headed back outdoors; not to play in the snow this time, but to walk to the general store to purchase an adult coloring book and some markers since she had been told that it could be therapeutic. She remembered loving to color in her youth, and after her fun morning of acting like a child she thought it was worth trying it again. She didn't care if her husband, son, or anyone else for

that matter, found it silly. If she ended up enjoying it as much as she hoped, she planned on bringing her colouring material to the office when she felt ready to go back.

The sidewalks had all been plowed by the time Olivia went out the second time, so it was much easier to walk, but the snow was still falling pretty hard and the massive street plows were loudly shoveling large piles of collected snow out of the way again. Olivia noticed a middle aged man struggling to shovel out a parking space and did not envy him. She did kind of feel jealous of the toddler being pulled in a red plastic sled though. She loved sleigh rides; another thing to add to her happiness list.

After her quick shopping trip, Olivia came back home with her desired coloring material along with an intermediate level paint by the number set of a lovely winter scenery she found on sale. She felt the need to do creative things to occupy the rest of her time off; maybe develop a new hobby.

Olivia had already done a lot that day though, so she spent the rest of it napping and losing herself in her entertaining novel once more.

Although she would be obliged to face reality by eventually going back to the office, Olivia promised herself to focus on her well-being and continue enjoying the freedom she was recently given. She recognised that she really needed to recharge, but also go back to a better work environment which would have to start with changing her own unhealthy behavior. She would need to start taking proper breaks, drink plenty of water to stay hydrated, and step away from her desk during her lunch hour. She would also have to take moments to breathe and speak up when things became too hectic, just as her psychologist had already recommended. In addition, it would be very important for her to learn how to separate her work life and personal one, for her own sanity; not just technology wise. If her employer didn't like it, Olivia could always start looking for another job in hopes that the new position would give her less anxiety. Olivia's mental health absolutely had to come first, and she would welcome the next snow day Mother Nature provided to chill out.

Chantal Bellehumeur is a Canadian author born in 1981. She has several published novels of various genres as well as numerous short stories, poems, and articles featured in compilation books, magazines, plus a local newspaper. She loves using her imagination and creativity. Chantal used to act both on stage and for the camera. She met her husband while working as an extra in a movie. She has a son from a previous relationship who has inherited her artistic abilities and interest.

Along with writing, Chantal loves doing arts and crafts. She’s developed a passion for painting which she finds therapeutic. As a volunteer for Crohn’s and Colitis Canada, she also enjoys impersonating different superheroes for their yearly charity event. She suffers from Ulcerative Colitis, and has been using writing as well as other forms of art to help her relax. She also loves to travel.