These Years in Winter...

originally written on December 30, 2010

 The wind picks up outside.  It howls and screams in the darkness that surrounds this farm where I now live.  It sounds sad to me, like a lost child crying desperately to a parent who isn't there.  I know that feeling as I've cried out for a father, both in this world and in Heaven.

 I shiver as the cold drafts come through the old windows and run their fingers across my cheek and neck.  That cold caress is maddening.  Some nights, I sleep under the covers to combat the cold.  Most nights, I don't think about it.  It's just the way life has been, the way things are.  It's just the way it is.
 I lay here, cold and alone.  Although, at times, it makes me extremely sad, it is a truth I've grown accustomed to.  I've gotten used to the cold chill of the air and having no one beside me in life to talk to about it, to gather with, to fight with.  I've become used to being alone.  I occupy an empty room in an empty house where all the rooms are dark except for the flicker-glow of the late night television dancing across the grey walls around me.  I've become welcoming to my own voice in my head, speaking to me, and yes, listening.  It's the only way I've remained sane.  I know it.  It's the only way to relieve the darkness and get it out into the light.

 The wind outside blows harder.  It sounds precursory, as if a greater storm is building-- like the growl of a mad dog before its bark and bite.  It blows against and rattles the windows in their frame.  The sound makes me feel peaceful, believe it or not.  It's comforting to know that my mind, body and soul are not the only things at unrest.

 Perhaps, tonight I'll be able to sleep.  Perhaps, I'll be able to dream; not of loss, failure or pain, for there is simply no greater torture than to relive feeling someone you loved and lived a life with disappear and be ripped away again and again; to awake alone with the realization they they don't love you anymore.  That is the greatest pain, the greatest loss.

 So, tonight, I lay down, comforted by the thrashing wind.  I'll slide my legs under the many layers of cover and pull them up to my chin.  I will take a deep breath from the cold draft at my window and I will close my eyes to a whispered prayer.

 Perhaps, tonight, I'll be able to sleep.  Peacefully, in the midst of the storm.

Brice