Since and only because I get to come home to a heated box, I love when it finally gets cold out. And for me, cold is any day where the high temperature never goes above freezing. We're getting a string of them right now: the local rivers are already becoming choked with ice. It's wonderful.
And I love going out in it. Winter is the only time of year I get to feel my body struggle to stay alive. It's invigorating and it reminds me that I still want to be here even though my life affords me precious few days to actually enjoy it.
The Summer heat saps my will to live. I accept it only because Winter alone would destroy the food chain. The heat of Summer is necessary. I understand that...but with every heatwave, my body is all the more ready to surrender to death. It is only in the bitter, numbing cold that I feel myself remembering I still have things I want to do and that I'm not yet ready to give up on them.
And yet it is only in the Winter when pity is taken upon me and I find myself being offered more rides both home and to work. I look forward to these chills all year only to have them taken from me by some misplaced kindness. I just want to walk in it. I want to feel my body's aura of heat stripped away. I want to endure the pain of the wind on my face and fingers. I want to feel the cold creeping up my arms and legs. I want the hurt. I want my body to tell me it will not go down without a fight. I want to experience the desire to survive another day. It is the closest I come to knowing meaningful struggle.
I'm tempted daily to surrender on all fronts and return to the void but Winter reminds me to press on for there may still be a use for my being yet...
So if you see me walking in the cold and/or in the snow, leave me be. Don't deprive me of one of the few joys that still has not been taken from me...
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