Always Winter...

...and never Christmas.

Those words from The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe have been sticking in my mind, especially today as the softly falling snowflakes glint in the pale light and stick in clumps to bare gray branches and bowing green junipers.

The little girl and boy perpetually reading on the bench beside our walk retain their smiles while wrapped in a steadily thickening snowy coverlet.

This snow falls slowly in large, shimmering flakes. A recent snow fell quickly in heavy flakes that mounted to a point above their little heads like a communal dunce cap.

Today's snow is beautiful, but it is snow. And we have had a lot of snow this long winter. After the holidays, snow just isn't as much fun. It's pretty when the roads can be kept clear, but the country roads (on which my Rural Letter Carrier husband must drive) have been ice-covered most of the lengthy time since Thanksgiving.

Which makes me feel as if it is always winter and never Christmas. Today I am reminding myself that dawn dispels night and spring follows winter. The voice of the turtle dove will soon be heard in our land.