Beautiful Snow

Being home for Christmas will not, as I had anticipated, be the highlight of the year, but being home for Christmas and being surrounded by an abundance of fresh snow in a place that usually only gets a few centimetres each year has made my visit home more beautiful than I could have imagined. Nearly two feet in as many days? Yes, please! It looks as though we will certainly have snow on Christmas day too, as we've gotten so much and it's staying nice and cold outside. Beautiful, lovely, winter.

Winter: the end of things

Now definitely into the month of December, it feels very much like winter. We've had a proper snow in Leeds, though it didn't last long; I've been to Christmas parties/receptions; had real English mince pies, mulled wine; and I even received a little advent calendar/Christmas card in the post from my mom. Definitely wintertime, definitely Christmastime.

And, as winter is the last of the seasons, December the last of months, the days are short, darkness surrounds us, the landscape is bleak with naked trees... I feel a general air of ends and deaths about the world. The year comes to a close, and we close our notebooks as the semester ends, and for me it will be an even more drastic change, leaving England for home next week, ending my time here for a span, and spending Christmas in Canada before coming back again to Britain.

But just as I will return here again, with the end of the year comes a new one, with the end of the semester another follows close behind, and with Christmas, there is the celebration of a new beginning and new hope for the world. There is new hope for each wretched human crawling through each day and struggling to stay alive amidst the death of the year in winter. I must remember it's not by my strength I stay alive, and that there is one who keeps the earth turning through winter into spring and summer, one who cares that I turn with the earth and change and grow in time.