As I walked the short way to the bus stop to meet my boys’ afternoon bus, I breathed deeply of the cool refreshing air. It was cold, but not terribly so. The birdsong along the footpath sung to me of Spring, even though we are still technically in the dead of winter. As a breath of air hit me, I had a sudden flashback to my childhood. A day just like this popped into my head, cool and refreshing, with hints of Spring coming on the wind. Little piles of melting snow filled the yard, and the Stars of Bethlehem were just starting to push their way up through the muddy yard. It was March, and Spring was just around the corner, all the more beautiful because of the long weeks of cold winter. This day felt just like that day, except this day was one of the last days of January, not March.

I grew up in Arkansas, so winters were never terribly extreme or very long, but in my memory, they were colder and more solidly winterlike than they are now. I have distinct memories of struggling through knee deep snow drifts, sledding down frozen hills in the cow pasture, and waking up early to break through the ice in the stock tanks. I remember winters with broken water lines, large elaborate snow sculptures, and even a collapsed roof on the milk barn due to too much snow weighing it down.

I’ve never been a huge fan of cold, and I rejoice just as much as the next person on the random 70 degree days that are becoming more and more frequent in today’s winter. But, at the same time, I feel sad. Sad that a whole season seems to be slipping away all too quickly. I get insanely happy with every flake of snow I see, I like crunching through frozen puddles just as much as my kids, and I long for days of creative focus indoors while a snow storm rages outside. I’m mourning the loss of winter.

I recently finished reading The Overstory by Richard Powers, a story focused on trees and their relationship to humans, centered, as you might suspect, on our destruction of both the magnificent beings that trees are and the environments they live in. As the story wound its way towards the end, the various human characters’ stories intertwining in a complicated dance, the crisis turned chaotic. Things seemed to be rushing towards a terrible end, and I worried about how this book would finish. I wanted it to end with hope rather than despair, yet at the same time, I didn’t want that hope to be shallow or false. I really wanted to hold on to this sense of impending doom, because I think our only chance of shifting anything in our downward spiral towards extinction is to accept that it is actually happening. I know that there are people who refuse to acknowledge climate change at all, but I feel as it gets harder and harder to deny, the vast majority of people find themselves in voluntary denial. They admit that climate change is a thing and a very big problem, but find it much easier to close their eyes and ignore it in order to get through their days. And I don’t blame them. I find myself there often, because the problem seems too big and I feel too small.

I don’t want to spoil the ending for anyone who wants to read this book (which I do recommend), but I will say that I did find a sense of hope, but it wasn’t an individual hope or an easy close your eyes and relax sort of hope. It was collective and complicated. And as I finished my walk to the bus stop with all of these themes settling into my consciousness, I felt a kinship to all the living things around me, not just humanity, but the world of trees, birds, and animals. We humans are a relatively late addition to this society of living things. I hope we have the time to learn from our brothers and sisters before our time is up.