As I glance out the rain-splattered window, a flock of geese create a dark “V” against the gray sky. The weather forecast predicted a frost this evening; something that will officially end the growing season. And even though this happens every year, and even though I love fall and the colorful leaves and Thanksgiving and the first snowflakes, for some reason my chest hurts as I think about the coming winter.
Sure enough, the next morning a thick coat of frost covers the ground, and our little corner of the world is, as a general rule, quite cold. When I walk into the bookstore the next day, I see that my coworkers are setting up the Christmas trees, and Christmas music plays in the background.
Yes, I love it…sort of. The glittery red Christmas card display, the twinkling lights on the mistletoe tree, the festive music.
And yet.
Where did the summer go, I wonder?
I’m getting older, and time is flying by, and another season is changing. Another fall is almost gone. Soon it will be dark in the evenings and dark in the mornings and I’ll wake up to a blanket of snow on the ground.
But it’s more than the cold and the dark. Soon it will be 2022–didn’t 2021 just start? Why does time move so quickly? What even is time?
But perhaps the real reason this winter feels so sad to me is that it marks the end of something.
I can’t pinpoint what. It’s more than the end of the growing season, more than the end of 2021. But something has slipped out of my reach. Along with warmth and with summer, we lost something. It happens every year, and I know we’ll gain it back in the spring. Winter doesn’t last forever.
And yet, as the nights grow dark earlier, as the geese leave to find a new home that doesn’t involve snow, and I rub my cold hands together, I still feel the loss.
The summer is over. All the good, all the bad, all the emotion and wonder and heartbreak and laughter–it’s gone now.
But perhaps, even though we’ve lost something–though many things have died–maybe they’re making room for more things to grow. Maybe winter will hold its own special treasures. Maybe there will be more laughter, more tears, more life even when it feels like the world around me is dying.
So I stand with my face toward the dark clouds and drizzling rain and watch for the first snowflake, knowing that winter brings its own promise.
And the winter can be beautiful too.