Winter is hard for several reasons but one is that you can't pet the cat without her fur matting down and sending electric shocks something awful.

It sneaks up on you. Today, for example, it was bright and clear and crisp as anything and I thanked God to be alive and able-bodied as I raced my bike out the driveway and down Wellington. But tonight I am in the pit. You are in the pit so deep and fighting hard but then I guess you realize that you're here because it's February. And things won't get better til late March, probably, when Spring comes with a warm wind stirring up and you can smell things outside again other than just cold and frozen-nose. You can smell things again like mostly melting snow and road gravel, wind (this is biking at night with bright white street lamps, feeling my handlebars without mitts on for the first time in a while).