The Santa Fe New Mexican

Jessica López understands the message behind the character she portrays: a distressed teenager suppressed by her father's Latino macho culture, by her mother's strict rules and by her liberal American classmates' ideals.

Snow days can be an interruption, a bother, a halt to carefully made plans. They don't have to be, though.

Properly handled, snow days -- when school is canceled and work is late and parents have to adjust schedules to provide child care -- ought to be a gift.

Because once the snow has fallen and school has been canceled but the roads are plowed, the entire family can jump in the car or walk to a steep park and take time out for fun.

Legends, ceremonies, traditions perhaps the mythology of tea gives it such an air of romance.

Tea conjures up images of High Tea in Victorian England, the starkly beautiful Japanese tea ceremony or the marvels of ancient China. Tea's ability to engage our imagination might be why having tea on a winter's afternoon holds special appeal. It warms more than our bodies: It seems to warm our souls as well. And Santa Fe offers plenty of opportunity for the warmth of tea, whether out or to take home.

TRAINS, LIKE CHRISTMAS, have an air of magic about them, especially when they are historic steam locomotives. Merge Christmas with these antique trains and you have the formula for a magical adventure. That is why the Santa Fe Southern Railway's holiday trains have become a Christmas tradition for many families. And those holiday trains are just one part of the winter train runs available in the Santa Fe area. At Santa Fe Southern Railyway, the most popular run is the Story Book Train, which revolves around a reading of Chris Van Allsburg's The Polar Express.

The exuberant hooting and hollering coming from the Las Vegas Robertson locker room after Saturday's dominant 26-0 win over St. Michael's was as much about a program announcing its return to state prominence as it was about a group of kids turning the page on the past.