Winter in Minne-snow-ta

Thomas Wentworth Higginson wrote:

“How many lessons of faith and beauty we should lose, if there were no winter in our year!”¹Higginson, Thomas Wentworth. Out-door Papers. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1863.

When I think about winter, I remember the snow-filled wonder of younger days. I also embrace winter as a time for reflection.

Winter Days of Youth

 Snow storm, North Saint Paul, Minnesota 1965
Blees kids playing in the drifted snow.²Minnesota Snow Storm, 1965. Blurry original owned by Patrick Blees, 2023.

Blees kids playing in piles of snow, North Saint Paul, Minnesota, 1962

Ice skating, Cass Lake, Minnesota, 1945³Ken Norenberg Ice Skating, 1945. Original owned by Ken Norenberg, 2023.

Building a snowman with a snowbaby on the campus of North Dakota State College (soon to be NDSU), 1960⁴Marilynn and Karrie Norenberg. Inset photo from Scrapbook, page 8. Original owned by Karrie Blees, 2023.

I have fond memories of cold and snow in winter. As a youngster, I loved to skate on the creek at the end of our dead-end street. When the icicles hung low off the eaves of the house, we carefully stood atop the snowbanks to harvest the longest ones to eat as popsicles. When the road was cleared of snow, my siblings and I made tunnels and forts in the deep snow piles at the end of the driveway. As a 13-year-old, I reveled in ultimate freedom with an Artic Cat snowmobile; with that machine, I sped across frozen Lake Minnetonka, my personal highway, and traveled wherever my heart desired.

Icicles hanging on a house⁵Wolcott, Marion Post, photographer. Icicles hanging from roof of house in Woodstock, Vermont. United States Vermont Windsor County Woodstock, 1940. Mar. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2017802447/. (not my childhood home)

Metaphorical Winter

I embrace winter as a season of waiting and anticipation. Life slows down in the winter; it is time to dig deep. In Minnesota, the daylight hours are fewer; it is time for reflection. The air is drier, crisper, sharper; it is time for clarity.

For all my family and friends, I wish you joy in the season of winter. Go outside and have some fun! And I wish you joy in your life journey, your winter time of patient waiting and reflecting.

What’s your favorite memory of winter?
How do you spend your wintertime?

SOURCES

• 1
  Higginson, Thomas Wentworth. Out-door Papers. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1863.
• 2
  Minnesota Snow Storm, 1965. Blurry original owned by Patrick Blees, 2023.
• 3
  Ken Norenberg Ice Skating, 1945. Original owned by Ken Norenberg, 2023.
• 4
  Marilynn and Karrie Norenberg. Inset photo from Scrapbook, page 8. Original owned by Karrie Blees, 2023.
• 5
  Wolcott, Marion Post, photographer. Icicles hanging from roof of house in Woodstock, Vermont. United States Vermont Windsor County Woodstock, 1940. Mar. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2017802447/.