The Faces of Winter

As a child, my favorite season was a bright sparkling world. The clouds poured their glittering white flakes over the house, the yard, the trees, the road, and the little pond in the neighbor’s yard. Before eight in the morning, a snowman had to be erected. If mom couldn’t be persuaded to part from her red scarf, I had to use dad’s. It was threadbare from years of use and covered in little linty pills. But it would do. Sometimes mom let us have hot chocolate with breakfast. We could only have candy canes and marshmallows if it was the afternoon, however.

In winter, the world lives in slow motion. My feet did not run as fast, and the air was slow to come into my lungs. Even the bird that glided on the freezing currents did not pivot or dive as they did in the springtime. The sun slept more, and the nighttime creatures prowled about. I was never afraid. I had a house to stay in. Night held wintry treasures of its own. I’d sit with dad and my baby sister, and we’d listen to the barking coyotes and sometimes the howling wolves in the deepest month of the winter.

Dad’s birthday was in January. He always asked mom to make him a German chocolate cake for his gift. Christmas always distracted us, and too soon, dad’s birthday was upon us. He didn’t seem to mind the homemade cards written in crayon the day of his birthday or the lack of gifts. We’d go to the high school to sled, me, dad, my brother and my baby sister. Mom told us she liked to stay inside, where it was warm.

It has been years since I’ve spent the winter with my family. My dad’s tastes have changed. He no longer wants cake on his birthday. My brother has been at college for a few years, so we don’t see him often. My little sister is studying to be valedictorian; it’s hard to drag her out of the textbooks she lives in. My mom still doesn’t like the cold. Mom and dad had another kid when I was in high school. He likes to build snowmen. I see the same giddiness in his face when the snow gathers on the ground, but it isn’t the same.

That big bright sparkling world has come to be my least favorite season. The sun shirks his duties. The sky obscures the roads and traps people in their homes. The wind ices the road, with ill intent. It becomes so unbearably cold. Even the air I need burns my lungs and freezes my heart. The darkness whispers things that I hadn’t been able to hear as a child.

Where I once saw beauty, I see danger. Where once I reveled in joy, I sink deeper into darkness. Has Winter changed, or have I?