Winter solstice 2023

Ripe persimmons hang on the sparse branches of trees along our road like Christmas ornaments. Additionally, each year in late December, our neighbour Diego brings a box of his perfectly ripe persimmons—oddly orange and succulent—and a crate full of holiday pleasure to our door. They are associated with the winter solstice, which represents the sun's rebirth. I arrange a couple beside the candles and cedar boughs on the mantle above the fireplace. Evergreen branches were draped over every window, door, and hearth in the house long before Christmas trees were brought inside. Bright green life, they represent the victory of life over death during the darkest season of the year and are an old talisman in deep winter. And it seems like a darker year this year.

I take time out during the weeks before the winter solstice to replenish my energies and nourish myself. I got the ideal present from a student years ago when I was an adult education instructor. I kept talking about how plants go into dormancy when the temperature drops and the amount of sunshine decreases. This is when a plant slows down its metabolism and stops developing. This student made the statement, "I can't become expansive in the spring if I don't pull in during the winter," to no one in particular. I was astounded. For the first time, I had an explanation for my main activities in late December: retreat and sloth. Since then, I have not felt guilty about hibernating, regretting almost nothing, or recharging.

The farmer's holiday falls usually in deep winter. My universe, the living world, has slowed down. I started sowing all of the winter and late autumn veggies in early August, spacing out the sowing every three weeks. Despite the snow, all of the cold-hardy crops that are currently flourishing in the gardens appear content. By November, the fava beans, onions, and salad greens had all been planted. Summertime is well and truly canned and dried in the cupboards. Nothing needs to be planted, no army of snails needs to be repelled, and there is no heat to gripe about. Yes, there are a few chores to do each day. Not many. The mid-January waxing moon is when the seedlings that will become the spring and summer gardens will be sown. Dawn doesn't arrive until 7:30. Consuming.

I've learned some amazing things about this mountain I adopted—or did it adopt me—by doing nothing. But to appreciate its winter beauty, I had to deliberately slow down first. With my hands and feet firmly buried in the ground during the summer, I find myself constantly staring at the dirt. I'm missing some things because I'm not looking up. With the same grace of a young deer jumping across the field, bare branches dance in the breeze. In the sunlight, the young oaks, still clinging to their leaves, are a golden hue. It's GREEN in my valley, maybe even greener than it was in midsummer. On the trees, moss is thickly growing. The spinach and fava are abundant in the fields. When it's cloudy outside, the variety of hues in Demeter's.

However, there is now a drawback. Over time, it has been gradually encroaching on us. I can tell that something is wrong when I gaze up and beyond the work that occupies my days. And it wasn't for a long time. Although there are fewer wild predators, the ones that do manage to cross our fences are more vicious and ravenous. The fact that the snow on top of our mountain falls two months later than it did a few years ago and that grasshoppers are more of a nuisance than a novelty is information that none of my neighbours wants to hear from a climate scientist. After cutting the wheat in June, the farmers are switching to winter crops and leaving their fields fallow in the summer.