A chill in the air

"He felt for a moment uncreated. Another kind of awake."
from Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann

It's been cold in central Arizona. Where have our "just right" sunshiny winter days gone?

Confession: Aside from losing half my winter garden to it, I love the cold spell. It reminds me of the Midwest—the landscape that will always be my heart's geographic home.

Growing up in the Midwest, while the cold of winter could be bone-chilling, I always loved how within a matter of hours a snowstorm could whitewash the landscape from sky to earth. Or, in the case of cold without snow, how parsed and plain everything could look, yet still be beautiful in a pretty girl without make-up kind of way.

In Arizona, we are more accustomed to nature's extreme rise in mercury, but whether it's a harsh, sun-drenched heat or an unusual chill in the air, the shifts serve as reminders of our aliveness and the blessing of embodiment.