Winter's Centre

As I sit here looking out on the backyard bathed in sunshine after the last few days of cold, wet weather, a ladybug is taking advantage of the improved conditions and trekking up and down my study window. Autumn and Winter might be my favourites, but even I was relieved to see the sun reappear.

I have this weird theory, that whatever season in which you were born, that is when you feel most comfortable, most alive. I was born in late autumn, so the theory works with me, and asking the question of others seems to validate the theory to a large degree. Obviously it’s not foolproof, and many would berate the hypothesis, but it would make an interesting study nonetheless.

I’m all for rugging up in winter woollies and scarves, going for a walk in the bracing air, then coming home to a cheery fire and ugg boots, curling up on the couch with a fluffy blanket and hot coffee and munchies. As crazy as it might seem, going outside on a freezing cold clear night has its own rewards. The night sky is magnificent, stars in their millions, planets super bright, the Milky Way spread across the firmament in all its glory, and the moon, whether a sliver or a full orb, sharp and clear.

For others though, winter is something to be endured, simply a marking of time until spring presents itself again. Along with the signs of life bursting from the soil and adorning the trees, a corresponding awakening seems to occur within people, thawing the lethargy and warming their spirits.

I think Marya Hornbacher’s description of the seasons in her debut novel The Centre of Winter is very apt.

All the seasons here in the north move toward their own end, except winter, which moves towards its centre and sits there to see how long you can take it. Spring twitches impatiently in its seat like a child wanting to go outside, straining toward summer, and summer, all lush and showy, tumbles headlong toward the decay of fall. Fall comes and goes so fast it takes the breath away, arriving in brocades of red and gold and whipping them off in only a few weeks, leaving a landscape ascetic, stunned with loss.

Naked deciduous trees look so much colder when the wind comes roaring down from the mountain. The evergreens are blown this way and that, but their leafy covering appears to give them some protection. But those that are bare reach heavenwards with frozen spindly fingers, totally exposed to the elements, absorbing whatever warmth they can when the sun appears to keep them going while they protect their inner core.

But today, all is calm. The sun’s caress causes you to shed a layer and venture out, and those waiting for winter to pass can take heart, for the fact we have now arrived at the centre marks the countdown until the cycle of seasons once more moves on.

Reaching up

soaking up the warmth

winter sun