Winter Seeds

I don't know if it's winter yet. Sometimes there's that ringing chill in the air, and I think it's come -- but it's true that fall can still have that icy briskness that gets in your lungs. I think there's still often a humidity, a certain flavor to the wind that makes me feel like winter hasn't yet come, though the cold might prompt me to think otherwise.

I think what's throwing me off is the silence. The stillness of being outside on a winter's night is shocking to me. It wakes me up, wakes something in me up, that doesn't get touched very often otherwise. I'm seeing it strong.

But as I look back on the last year, I see that that silence has been building regardless of the season. It's not confined only to the solitude that I seem to experience when I go for walks on winter nights. Even walking under the stars this summer, or with the autumnal smells, it's been there. I think it's just growing in me. This little seed of winter.

It is a frightening thing, I think. It's exciting during December -- you know that when you're heading out to your car, you'll be next walking into the warmth of a holiday party, or something like that. There will be red and green and white and blue all about, and the smells of wonderful food. The cold tastes sweet because it just makes the warmth all the stronger.

But in January and February, people become cold. The night feels lonely; you're not headed to someplace special. You have to fight through the chill, instead of letting it in.

I feel I'm growing less and less afraid of it. The prospect of feeling alone is frightening to me at the time, often. How could I survive it? The biting wind will cut right through my chest, and I won't be able to pretend at that point: my isolation will be totally exposed, my throat will shrivel and I'll choke, won't be able to say a thing.

But that doesn't happen anymore. The fear still arises, yes, but when I'm there -- no, I'm not alone. The feeling of loneliness, perhaps, but the sky! The stars! The air isn't empty: it is full, deliciously full, laden with the richness and electricity of snow and wind-beaten tree trunks. The acrid taste of desiccated leaves can cut into my nostrils, but there's room for it. There's moisture in me.