The Darkest Month

December.  The darkest month.  A reminder of the darkness inside all of us.  Everyone around me putting up all these decorative shining lights.  Trying to brighten things up I guess.  So much hustle and bustle.  So much rushing around.  So much planning and getting ready.  This year-end sprint.  Society’s remedy to this dark season.  I just find it all so very noisy and loud.  If I’m completely honest, I don’t really care for the Christmas holiday season.  Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy spending time with family and friends, but so much of it just seems forced and insincere.  All meaning lost.  Ruined by consumerism.  Another capitalist casualty.  Disconnected.  Nature isn’t really bothered by it all.  Forests.  Laying low.  Animals.  Cuddled up in their comfortable nests.  Understanding that the dark season is really meant for rest.  For slowing down.  For recovery and healing.  Sunday morning.  Steady north wind blowing.  Temps hovering around minus six Celsius.  The wet and muddy ground from a few days ago now frozen solid.  I roll down my driveway shortly after nine.  And slowly work my way over to the other side of the river.  Abandoning myself into this crisp tranquility.  A mid-ride snack.  Some warm forestea.  Life is good.  Really good actually.  In so many ways, I feel better this time this year than I have past years.  Maybe it’s the daily 8000 IU of Vitamin D that I’ve been supplementing with.  Or all these years of therapy and working on myself that are finally bearing fruit.  It isn’t about my life finally being perfect.  I guess it’s simply about being less scared of the dark.  Out here.  In nature.  Reconnected.  Comfortably sitting in the silence of my own darkness.