Boston promised snow – and gave me rain. Can you hear my heart breaking?

I was looking forward to a magnificently white winter, with school closures and an otherworldly hush. The weather had other ideas

I was excited to experience a Boston winter - being in snow country was a genuine attraction of our trip here - and last week looked set to deliver. The headlines were threatening me with a good time (predicted to be heaviest snowfall in two years" and pre-emptive school closures ran in ticker tape across the TV screen). Cars started sporting snowplough attachments, and the yoga teacher ended class not with namaste but with an ominous: Good luck with the storm."

My husband and I were giddy as toddlers. Would there be six inches of snow? Twelve? When I wake up at 4am," my husband said gleefully, studying his weather app, it should already be white." At the shop he asked, in all seriousness, if we should buy a sledge before they all sell out".

Emma Beddington is a Guardian columnist