Now Is The Winter of Our Content?

The textbooks all warn of the grey gloom that rides the coattails of Old Man Winter. I cannot say they are wrong; after all, I have endured many a winter, pitifully at the mercy of Lethargy, Despondency, and Melancholia - those bastardizing bastards of clinical feelings hopelessness and inadequacy. But tonight seems opportune to champion this season of hibernation, calling to our attention its most redeeming elements.

During the Renaissance, parental custom made it so that newborns remained tightly swaddled for most of their first year. While I am not sure this practice aided the physiological growth and/or development of basic motor skills in these sixteenth-century bright eyes, it must have done wonders for their young egos, what with its sensitivity to the disquieting transition from the All-I've-Ever-Known safety and security of the womb to the Dear-God-Save-The-Queen terror and helplessness of the big, bright world, detached from the umbilical cord.

The analogy here, of course, is that between the effect of swaddling and that of winter, the only season that retains just such a dramatic capacity for comfort and warmth. Yes, the irony is notable, given both the aforementioned and the temperatures, but three winter-specific factors make it so.

First, the darkness. I've always known more calm once the sun sets, I think because there is an unconscious sameness to night. Blackness is blackness in a way that the variance of the day is not; that is, the latter may bring partial cloudiness or bright blue skies - one never knows. But the night remains same. Dependable and familiar, brought on too by the cultural expectation of 'winding down', when work is to be put aside without guilt, and the casualness of prolonged rest, relaxation, and late-night solitude are encouraged. The darkness, and thus its accompanied reminders of the womb, is as a matter of the course of earthly tilt protracted during the months surrounding the Winter Solstice, so you can see the connection here, can you not?

Second, the snow. Is it any wonder the poets use words of inclusion to describe the effect of snow? It covers like a blanket, or whiteness envelops the landscape. The soft powder swaddles our earth, building up a fortress of protection around our homes, and in turn shrinks our world. When the heavy flakes fall, we cannot see but a few hundred feet beyond our windows. The sky and the trees and and the lawn and the roofs reflect the simplicity of white, establishing momentarily a commonality across time and space. I know I am here, that I am safe. Need I know more? asks Descartes.

Finally, the cold. What could be more antithetical to the warmth of the womb? And, yet, it is this very cold that reminds us of what we have lost and prompts us to reclaim what was once rightfully ours. To wit, we bundle up, wrap ourselves in wool and scarves, light raging fires of heat inside our homes and fill our bellies with the hottest of stews, teas, and soups. We are injecting heat just as we are defending against cold. Long past are the summer days where we exposed our skin and bared our souls. No, now, we pull each other close, for warmth, yes, but also in defense against the pitiless brutality and heartlessness of winter, which reminds us like no other season of our weakness, of our vulnerability, of our loss.