The feeling of December ~ November 28, 1996

David Heiller

It really feels like December.

Certain months have certain feelings. When sap starts running, it feels like March. When frogs start peeping, it feels like April. When leaves start falling, it feels like September.

But December is different.

It’s in the light mostly. Maybe there’s a scientific explanation for where the sun is in the sky, and how it reflects off fresh snow. I don’t want to know about that. It might spoil the feeling of December, the way learning how to pilot a steam boat spoiled the Mississippi River for Mark Twain.

I felt December for the first time last Saturday, November 24. It came a week early for me, but Mother Nature doesn’t go by our calendar. Quite the contrary.

I was lying in bed at about 7:30, and I looked out the window, and there it was, that light of December. Α couple inches of fresh snow had fallen, and the sun was just coming up, and the bedroom was filled with December.

It was like God hadn’t just brought a new day, he had brought a whole new season, one that carried hope and promise.

I wanted to jump up and tear into the hope and promise, the way a person does in the spring when the weather is perfect and the garden is ready for planting.

Yet at the same time I wanted to lie in bed a few extra minutes to soak it up. 1 wished it would last forever. Every year I feel it, and every year it is good.

Ah December!
A wintry ride for Claire with Mom and Dad.

Some of it has to do with childhood memories. The first snow meant ice skating on the harbor and on the river bottoms. It meant snowmen, and snowball fights, and sliding down the big hill, across the street, and down past our house, two whole blocks of sliding if you didn’t get hit by a car, and no one ever did, because we took turns watching out.

The feeling of December back then carried thoughts of Christmas vacation, and presents, and good food, and more of the fun things like skating and sledding.

I don’t have quite those same experiences in my life now, but the feeling of December is just as good. The snow is clean and new. It seems to fall in big, feathery flakes. It belongs here, and it’s ours. People who have fled to Texas and Florida are missing it. We may envy them in March, but now it is their turn to envy us. It’s the kind of weather Robert Frost would write poems about.

The promise of a new season is here. Yes, it is winter, and yes, winter can be hard. Who will ever forget last year? No one wants to relive that. But we need change. It’s good for us. It rejuvenates us. It gives us new things to do. It brings wonder, about how everything can shut down for four months and then rejuvenate itself again.

And there’s something good about that fresh snow and those cold temperatures. There’s something good about the white blanket that’ spread over the garden. There’s something g about giving the lakes and rivers a rest, about seeing them skim over with ice.

The feeling of December brings the satisfaction of having the storm windows on and the woodpile nice and neat and the outside tools and toys put away and everything buttoned down like a snug sweater.

And then there’s the anticipation of Christmas. I know it can be a stressful time, with the pressures of giving the right gifts and going to family gatherings. But these are overshadowed by cutting the Christmas tree and smelling a kitchen full of fresh baked cookies and watching the kids in the church Christmas program and by a hundred other little pleasures of life.

That’s my sermon for today. The feeling of December. Did you catch it? It will be gone soon enough.