It Ain't the Snow

You know, every now and then I think I don't like winter. But, skating home from work last evening, a trip that took three to four time as long as it would've if the roads had been clear, I decided that it's not winter I don't like. It's that life moves too quickly these days to be able to truly enjoy it.

When winter storms hit, whether the snow is only floating down slowly like feathers, or blowing sideways in sheets from the force of a nasty north wind, it's still a beautiful thing to witness. When the snow has fallen, and the full moon waxes to shine on it, giving the snow an ethereal blue sheen dusted with opalescent glitter, well, that's about as beautiful a sight as I've ever seen.
And then there are those ice storms, where every single thing out in the weather gets swathed in a crystal clear coating of ice. I mean everything: houses, cars, power lines, power poles, lawn decorations, trees, fences, even single specific blades of grass. I love walking on icy grass, hearing it crack and feeling it crunch under my feet.

Yeah, I still love winter.

The problem is that most of us today don't get to have snow days anymore. It shouldn't be that way. There's always some job we have to go to, some place we have to go. Life moves too fast. Heaven forbid we just slow down in the winter like almost everything else in nature. I'm thinking that's what winter, particularly when snow and ice takes over, is for...slowing down, and remembering that sometimes we need to just...be.

Here's part of a lyric to a song called 'Only Be,' by Eric Schwartz. To me, this is how winter should be:

Build me a cabin, surround me with snow.
Cuz I'd like to be where there's nowhere to go,
Someone beside me, sippin' on tea,
And under the afghan we'll be,
Only be.

Folks don't get to 'only be' anymore. That's what I don't like. It ain't the snow, it's the 'busy.'