Winter

As this is a piece I wrote for school, I would greatly appreciate any feedback.

Sometimes in winter, the world closes for a moment. It’s as if someone has shut a glass box on the world, leaving it on its own to fend for its life. Everything holds its breath. Everything is moving, but nothing is. Often this is dark. It’s cold, grey, and tight. Winter has left us on our own, and there is nothing we can do to open up again. 

    Being a summer person, I always feel small and cold during the winter. Nothing is right. The ground is frozen, the sky is smothered with clouds, and I scrunch my face up as the short days turn to cold nights. Staying inside makes me irritable. Going out makes me sad. Time creeps along in a tired way that makes me sleepy too. Summer seems far off, like a beacon shining at the end of a long tunnel.

    And yet, winter is in many ways the warm season. The heat is turned up in all houses, fires roast cold faces, woolen sweaters wrap us up in slow dreams. There can be no warmth without cold, no light without dark. Winter may close us up, but it is something that is necessary. Relaxing. Waiting. Sleeping under a canopy of silentness. Curling up our toes and watching the Superbowl. Whatever it is, winter makes us close our eyes and pull the covers up over our heads. And that is in a number of ways a good thing.

    Winter means rest. Winter means to sit and watch and think. I warm up my fingers by curling them up into themselves, just like I curl myself up into my house. We nod off to sleep, waiting until winter nudges us awake, allowing us to face another day.