Bleak
Mid-Winter
“In
the bleak mid-winter, frosty wind may moan,
Earth
stood hard as iron, water like a stone;
Snow
had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,
In
the bleak mid-winter, long ago...”
Christina
Georgiana Rossetti (1830-1894)
It's
about this time every year this mournful hymn begins to play in a lot
of minds. It's a low down feeling that creeps up your spine and sits
on you head like a sad little monkey. Cabin fever threatens to drive
you mad until you spend five minutes outside, and then those
suffocating walls become a sanctuary from the cold. I said to someone
recently that winter may be my favorite season in Birmingham—that
was on a sixty degree day in January. February is
different.
In
the middle of this seemingly endless winter, motivation becomes
difficult. I don't know about you, but I can stand at the window
willing the scene outside to change, for long stretches of time.
Trying to summon an idea to write about that anyone else would want
to read, seems an impossibility. In fact, industry of any sort is
like a distant vista, shrouded in fog, that one cannot quite make
out. Suddenly the idea of going back to bed until spring seems the best possible option.
Perhaps
you know this winter malady. You may even be standing at your window,
too; wondering what on earth to do with this day that stretches
endlessly into gray. Take heart. The earth is turning, however
maddeningly slow it may be. Spring will arrive with daffodils and
bird song. We can do this. Let us stand against the cold, and give
one another encouragement. The robins are here, flocking on my front
lawn, always a good sign of things to come. Make yourself a cup of
cocoa. We'll get through this together.
In
the Spirit,
Jane
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