Winter

Winter Whispers 

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The world is feathering around me, turning my cozy home into a silent scene in a snow globe. The frost frames the window pane, turning it into an artistic trope. The wind has plastered the sides of my little cottage in snow, and I can still see the trees outside tremble in its icy grip. The cold has become absolute, bespoken by its aura radiating from the panes like a pulse. 

Winter has arrived properly enough, fluffed its feathers, and settled in for its stay. Just how long it will sit upon the nest of the earth remains to be seen.  

Winter Whispers

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cute-girl-hai-snow-winter-Favim.com-355943Stepping outside, her feet meet diamonds on the sidewalk, the snowglobe world silently having been turned upside down as she had worked. The turn seems to have met its zenith as the flakes fall fast and thick and heavy. The stark white feathers flutter against her eyelashes and brush her cheeks cunningly, leaving a flushing pink behind as warmth rushes up to her skin after their cold kisses. Pulling her scarf tight, she glances up at the slate-grey sky, which just seems to smile at her in the form of a cold breeze lifting the curls of her hair for a brief moment, and a few snowy zephyrs leap up from the thickening drifts to play and nip at her ankles as she starts to make her way home. But she deviates today, her feet carrying her from path to park; such an even as the first snow deserves the respect of observation. Soon, her steps go from diamond-dusted to a pleasant crunch not unlike that first bite into perfect gingerbread. The wind flirts saucily with the hem of her coat and that of her skirtsnowy legs underneath it, caressing her legs with frosty fingers as though whispering her own beatuy back to her.

The world seems to grow quieter amidst the silence of the snowfall, the flakes interlocking their unique lattices together to form heavy white carpet that softens the cacaphony of the world. The hum and buzz and bustle seem to fall away, dampened by wintry ethereality, as if they cannot bear to disrupt such a transformation. A transformation that borders on the divine, with her as its single witness.

She has always loved winter, the long sleep of nature. Everything must take its rest, even the world itself in its turn. She loves the promise that lies in bare branches and blanched grass, to imagine what nature has in store for its next act in her lifetime. Even more so than that, winter teaches her to revel in the what is and the now. In this moment, not the looking forward or the glancing behind.

And so she walks in snowy footsteps, the world gone silent around and above her. Winter recognizes Her worshipper, a lady of Her court, and sends icy diamonds to adorn her hair and cloak her shoulders for this, the overture to Winter’s first whisper.

girl-in-the-snow

Nightlight Snowfall

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I wish I could show you the snow from my window. Few things are as beautiful to me as a nighttime snowfall.The flakes are big and fat, kissing the window-pane as I sit on the other side.They shake, shiver, and fall in the purple-white glow of the street light across the street, like feathers shaken loose from a heavenly pillow. Silent, it covers the world like softest blanket, greeting morning light with airy brightness. It is peace personified, and so, for a moment, I sit and watch.

NaBloPoMo 2014 Day 17: Snow-Capped Joys

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Today was my daughter’s first day playing in the snow. It’s her third winter, if we want to be technical but her first time playing in the snow. When she was born, her birth ushered in the heaviest snow as of yet that winter. I spent that winter mostly indoors with my new little infant. The following year, the winter was one of the coldest on record. So I kept my one-year-old inside for the most of that icy winter.

This year, winter has settled itself into our little part of the country quickly. The temperatures are already supposed to dip into the single digits within the next few days, so I decided to take advantage of what will be the warmest day this week and take my daughter out into the new-fallen snow (we got at least two inches last night). So I bundled her up in coats, boots, hat, mittens, and scarf and out we went into the snow, her first real foray into the white stuff. The sun was bright and the world was pristine and clean. Rogue zephyrs played in the air, swirling snow from trees and rooftops into dancing shapes. The cold air hit me like a sudden kiss and took my breath away. Bizzy held tentatively onto my hand as we started walking on the driveway but, by the time we got into the yard, I let her go to find her feet on her own. It was powdery and blowy and we walked through the sunshiny snow over the patio and into the back yard, feeling it crunch beneath our boots and I watched my daughter examine it with wonder. The first time she put her hands into the snow, she held them up as if holding something ethereal and divine. Her cheeks were appled and her eyes pretty little half moons from the smile hampered only by her pacifier, which she soon relinquished to me in favor of laughs and smiles as she tromped off into the snow.

First time in snow 2014

The Silence of Winter

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After taking out the trash this afternoon, I found myself just standing there in the falling snow, looking out at my backyard and the field and park beyond it. Snowflakes swirled around me in the wind, the world was white and clean, the trees reaching up their bare arms to a grey sky. Yes, it was cold; yes, it’s winter and dreary. But what I love about it was there. Indiana in the winter has this profound, beautiful silence, if you will allow yourself to be still enough to enjoy it.

The cold, clean scent of winter was refreshing. The silence was heartening. It was just a moment but one that I sorely needed.