The snow was falling hard over North Baltimore Monday morning. Neighborhood streets were empty. Interstate 83 was quiet.
In Woodberry, the families hunkered down inside. Yet the lights shone from one stalwart neighborhood institution.
”We don’t close for anything,” said Kelly Mullinix from behind the bar of the Clipper Mill Inn.
The bartender had arrived at 7 a.m., just like any other day, to open the longtime dive bar. The snow outside had closed schools and roads and offices, but here at the affectionately nicknamed “Bloody Bucket,” they were unfazed.
Someone had shattered the front window and burglarized the bar overnight. The owner and staff cleaned up the mess and boarded the window. Then they shoveled the sidewalk, spread salt and opened.
”People get a little rowdy with the first snow,” Mullinix said.
Tyler Vinje had been called off from his construction job and considered staying in bed for exactly one moment. Then he was texting friends to meet at the bar and make the most of a day without work.
He was waiting for them at the bar when Dakota Baeta walked in to deliver the mail.
The postal carrier had started out early on his mail route around Woodberry to try to finish before the worst of the snow. Originally from California, he had followed his partner to Baltimore.
“I moved here for love,” he said.
Monday brought his first snowstorm. In wool socks and a heavy alpaca sweater, he was warm and he found the quiet, empty streets to be peaceful.
Alanna Berman was one of the few people outside. She was trudging through the upturned slush from a snowplow to climb a bank overlooking the Union Collective businesses.
”I just loved it. It’s like the first time we got real snow,” she said.
She was looking for something and when she found it, she just stopped to soak it in — a patch of freshly fallen, untouched snow.
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