The Lady of the Cold

There is an absolutely beautiful segment in the book "Moominland Midwinter" that describes the coldest, darkest night of the winter embodied by the Lady of the Cold. The Lady of the Cold is an incredibly beautiful spirit of pure white (though she may look red or green from certain angles) with clear blue eyes who moves slowly through Moominvalley. Meeting her gaze causes any living thing to instantly freeze. And yet it is hard not to look at her as she passes.


I was in awe when I read that part of the book.

It captured the dichotomy that makes winter unique: it is at its most beautiful when it is deadliest. The cold that kills plants, animals, and people also creates a world that is still, silent, and crystalline. I think about that dichotomy whenever I'm somewhere experiencing deep cold.

Both of my parents were snatched from this planet in the extreme cold. Both in January as a matter of fact, though my mother hung on in a coma until early summer. And yet when we have those days here in New York or when I travel north in the middle of winter as I will in a couple weeks I marvel at the pure, clear and sharp definition of my surroundings. I'm mesmerized by the way sound seems to travel so much farther through the cold still air.



Cold like that may kill, but it also makes you feel more alive. Step outside into it and you are slapped awake, made fully present in the moment. You are aware of every moment more than any other time in your life. Which makes me wonder: is it the cold that makes the world more beautiful, or does it simply sharpen your senses and make you more aware of what's around you?


Or maybe I'm just crackers. That could be it too, I think.

Then again, I share some of the same ethnic stock as Tove Jansson who wrote the Moomin books. Like my maternal grandmother, she was ethnically Swedish but lived in Finland. It would seem that blend would be very likely to make one in touch with the soul of winter on some primeval level. So maybe I'm not crackers, maybe I'm just reacting on some ancient, instinctive way to a season that circumscribed and defined the culture of some of my ancestors.


This morning the yard is full of squirrels, cardinals, blue jays, and sparrows feasting at the stale bread, suet and seed we've been putting out for them over the last few icy days. It's supposed to go above freezing today. Strangely, this makes me a little sad, though I'm glad that all of our yard critters seem to have come through the Lady's visit OK.


I guess I can still hope for that big snow to come and slow the world down again. Failing that, get on with it and bring on the spring. If there's one thing that does get me down, it's a half-assed winter!