Gray, Gloomy, Beautiful December

The winter has an allure.

It is shades of grays and melancholy. It is hot tea and cramped quarters, stories of yesterday extricated by the sheer force of time and proximity.

It is sweaters and blankets and secrets, short days and long looks, cabin fever and the upcoming hope of spring. The warming of the earth is still only potential and yet that very potential drives the season and its inhabitants onward into the growling darkness of frigidity.

I often think that summer is the repository for memories in a quantitative sense. Every day contains traces of the day before it and the lingering sun leaves a hint that more is always possible. Summer is bubblegum and swimming pools, barbeque and fireworks. It is satisfying, but fleeting, a victim of its own longevity.

Winter, then, is the qualitative answer to summer. Memories of winter seem to sink deeper, take longer to unpack, and leave a more satisfying draft. They are made around campfires and Christmas trees, places of requisite intimacy.

So while many hope that the spring arrives soon, I hope for another long December. I hope for more gray, more mist, more cold, more darkness. In that low light, close to those we love, some of the best memories surely wait to be made.

Here's to a long December...