Start Of The Winter -

And yet, there is a peculiar peace in this beginning. Winter starts with a closing of the door. It is an invitation to turn inward. The world outside becomes hostile, so we build a smaller, warmer world inside. We read thicker books. We drink darker coffee. We sleep longer.

For me, the start of winter is an auditory event. It is the silence. The great insect chorus of summer—the cicadas’ electric whine, the crickets’ nightly fiddling—has died. The birds have fled to softer latitudes. What remains is a hollow quiet, broken only by the dry rattle of oak leaves clinging stubbornly to their branches or the distant, lonely sound of a train horn, carried unnaturally far in the dense, cold air.

It does not arrive with the blare of a trumpet or the crash of a wave. The start of winter is a thief in the night—subtle, apologetic, and utterly final. One morning, you step outside, and the air has changed. It is not merely cold; it is different . It has a texture, a crispness that feels less like atmosphere and more like a held breath.

The start of winter is not an ending. It is a reset. It is nature’s great pause button—a long, dark night of the soul that, if we are wise, we do not fight, but embrace. We light a candle against the gloom. We pull our coats tighter. We exhale, watching our breath turn to visible smoke in the air, and we whisper to the coming cold: I am ready.