THE ONLY way to get around the Washington suburbs is by cross country skis, unless you own a four wheel drive vehicle and even then it is a problem.
When skiing yesterday along River Road, normally a busy four lane highway, I saw only a couple of four wheel drive vehicles, passing by in a cloud of snow.
River Road had been ploughed on Sunday, being a snow emergency route, but so much snow fell overnight that cars without chains could not negotiate even its gentlest gradients.
Washington has not seen such snow since 1922. It began to fall late on Saturday evening. By Sunday morning the snow in our driveway in the north western suburbs was exactly 12 inches deep.
I cleared it away, but by afternoon another seven inches had accumulated. I cleared it again. Yesterday morning there was another 12 inches, making a total of 31 inches.
In the city centre the official total recorded was 25 inches, three inches short of the 1922 record.
The deep, fluffy snow turned the White House into a snow house. Skiers whizzed by on Pennsylvania Avenue. The centre of the city was eerily quiet.
In the suburbs the usual noise of planes overhead ceased.
Everything has come to a standstill. No schools are open. The shopping malls are shut.
No one has come to collect rubbish bins, but they couldn't be found anyway. Trash cans, hedges and cars along our driveway have disappeared under mounds of snow.
No postman came yesterday, though the US postal service prides itself on getting the mail through hail, sleet or snow.
No newspapers have been delivered since Sunday. I saw a man stomping around his garden. He said he was looking for his Sunday paper. He had seen it being thrown into his garden on Sunday morning. By the time he got dressed to go outside it was buried and he's been trying to find it ever since.
The radio has put out appeals all day for blood donors and four wheel vehicles for hospitals. It gives advice on how to treat frostbite and to recognise hypothermia.
The storm brought out the best in people who generally spend a lot of time ignoring each other.
Skiers on the deserted roadways waved merrily to their fellow athletes and to the drivers of snow ploughs.
Neighbours called on old people to clear their driveways.
This was not as arduous a task as it might seem. The snow is dry and light, and blows everywhere.
The nightmare could come when it thaws a little and then freezes.
That's when branches will come down and roofs cave in, and roads and driveways will become stretches of concrete ice. So I'm off out with my shovel again.