Winter

It’s snowing here.  Big, fat, lazy flakes are drifting out of the sky, and they’re actually sticking.

One of the reasons I gave myself for leaving Wisconsin was my loathing for the miserable cold that grips the state for three or four months out of the year: a cold so deep, so bitter, that stepping outside can snatch the breath from your lungs and send you into a coughing fit.  It’s a cold that’s so complete that every day you step out into it all you can do is curse and wait for spring.  It sinks into your bones until you can’t even remember what it was like to be warm.  I used to step into a hot shower and feel warmth flow back into my feet and hands, never even having known that they were cold.

I never imagined that I could miss anything about it.

My first winter here was wonderful.  I laughed at friends complaining about the cold.  “Cold?”  I’d say.  “This is nothing.  You don’t know what cold is.” People back home suffered through months of below freezing temperatures and blizzards, and I laughed, knowing that that was all behind me, maybe forever.

But then spring came… or more accurately, didn’t.  Spring here is nearly the same as winter: long stretches of overcast grayness with intermittent rain.  It doesn’t start getting nice until the middle of May.  At home, every snowbank shrinking, every green leaf, and every rivulet of meltwater flowing down the storm drain was a tiny celebration.  The snowbank by the door is only three feet high now, I’d think.  It’s almost over!

I miss big snowfalls at night.  My last apartment in Madison had a second story porch, and every big storm, I’d make myself a cup of tea–never coffee, even though that’s all I normally drink–and stand on the porch, listening.  Without realizing it, it slowly developed into a little ritual.  It doesn’t sound like much, but it was the highlight of winter for me.  I never knew that until I’d moved here and couldn’t do it any more.

My normally busy street would be peacefully still, since everyone who could be off the roads, was.  The clouds in the sky and the new snow on the ground reflected the streetlights back and forth, illuminating the entire city with a soft pink-orange glow.  Every now and then a solitary car passed by slowly, or Megan would come out until she got cold–she’d huddle against me for warmth, and we’d talk–but mostly it was just me.  I felt like the only person in the world, and I sipped my tea and listened to the stillness.

If that sounds lonely, it wasn’t.  I knew that everywhere around me people were closing in for the night, cuddling up in blankets, or doing much the same as I was.  Soon, the plows would be by, the streets would be clear, and life would resume.  But just for a while… the whole world was quietly paused, waiting for the snow to stop.

It felt like home.