Squabbling with the winter – By Jaanu

I wake up before the sun on too many winter days. This isn’t saying much, as the sunrise is awe-inspiringly late in New England winters.

Not much is as uniquely unpleasant as waking up in the chilly darkness, except perhaps being woken up in the chilly darkness. Getting out of a cozy nest of blankets takes a will of steel. Water from the sink and shower is ice cold and takes so long to heat that often I give up and surrender to fate. I start school mornings by walking out the front door into total darkness unless we’re lucky and have a morning of merely semi-darkness. The sky is aurora-ish purple and blue when twilight fades and the sun begins to rise. Even our thick uniform sweaters do little to mitigate the piercing winter wind though we walk only from the car to school. Despite the bitter weather, some kids don’t have coats. It makes the coat drives we do more meaningful when we can feel the cold that others feel. Some kids choose not to wear coats, to avoid the bother of carrying a lot of fabric to their lockers. The cold reaches all the way to my bones despite my attempts to layer, but in a way, I appreciate this reminder that we are very small, and nature supersedes us. This thought is not comforting, however, when I walk down the chilly stairwell to my French class on the ground floor of the school building, or when I reach English class and find that my indomitable teacher (who possesses a truly iconic personality) has opened the classroom window, reducing some Southern state transplants to the mercy of the elements. When I see snow blanket the hills outside, I expect to see timber wolves and snowshoe rabbits right alongside the snow-capped cars in the parking lot. The pristine coat of snow gives everything a wild, untamed look; the regular city world is suddenly transformed into an icy hinterland. Normal tire tracks look like the semi-covered treads of huge beasts and black ice looks resembles the surface of glassy dark pools. Everyone’s cheeks look rosy and raw. Walking back out into the parking lot from the warm school gym is like walking the plank; no one wants to do it, and a cloud of kids are always lingering by the glass double doors that lead outside even an hour, two hours, after the bell rings.

Lakes and ponds have frozen over. A thick layer of ice caps every body of water. When it snows, a fluffy white blanket of crystalline flakes coats the lake and pond ice. When I stand on the ice at night and look out across the frozen water, I see a barren snowy wasteland – like a snowy desert or a tundra at peak winter. I can picture myself in Alaska or some far northern land; it’s cold cold cold all right, but shockingly beautiful every time. I’m thankful for the winter.

Winter is difficult to weather without resources: many coat charities work to provide children with warm winter coats. If you can, support charities like the Salvation Army, Operation Warm, and City Mission Boston’s Coat Boston program ☃️