Today, my father and I drove past the house I lived in until I was 6 years old, before my mom moved me to the sticks.

As as we drove closer to the house, I began to reminisce.

You know, it’s funny, the things that you remember. A patch of bluebells on the side of the house. A liquor store that gave out pretzel rods. A swingset. A stone path. A Chinese restaurant with the best crab rangoons.

You know, everybody is right. When you clear away the frills and fabrications, the little things are the only things that remain.

When did it become the norm to not say what you’re feeling and not be able to tell someone you’re thinking of them?

How did it all come to this? How have we all wrought bars of steel over our lips to keep our deepest thoughts within us in coherence with social mores?

I just don’t understand it. I feel like if you feel something, let your voice be heard.

But who am I to talk?

Here I sit, venting my thoughts to a blog no one will read, thinking deeply about someone to whom I won’t tell my true feelings.

Curse it all. I’m tired of this.

The snow is falling outside, and I, in my infinite foolishness, decided to go outside.

I just stood out there and…listened.

Have you ever noticed the incredible sound falling snow makes as it dances to the earth? That soft, ethereal whisper that falls like feathers on the ear?

I imagine it to be the same sound your mind makes when the most astounding yet simple thought occurs to you, or the quiet note played on your heartstrings when two lips meet in gentle kiss. Like your heart and mind, for that one, sweet moment, act in tandem with one another, and something, somewhere, whispers in your ear, “Yes.”

There is something so profound in the loud silence of snow. Something that captivates all senses and stirs your soul in a restless, hopeless way.

I don’t know how anyone could deny its beauty. I don’t know how anyone could help but adore the snow.

Where did my childhood go?

I swear, it was here but a moment ago.

There were swings and balogna sandwiches in my bag and little star-shaped dreams in my head.

Gone.

I wonder when it all faded. Was there a specific moment? Or did it just trickle out like the last drops in a Sunday cup of coffee? Or maybe it’s still here, dangling in the recesses of my mind.

I feel like such a child sometimes. It’s like it never left. Little moments that tug at something in my memory that take me back to a time when I was 5 or maybe 7. There were leaves on the trees and the future meant nothing to me. Life was pure and stupidly simple. Everything meant a lot to me, or nothing, I suppose. Life danced across the pages of whatever book I was reading and caught in my eyelashes like snowflakes.

Gone.

Now I feel so much older than 17. I grew up too quickly, I think. In my hunger for the world, I let it mold me into an adult before I was ready to be one. I didn’t shape my world for myself.

Sometimes I sit outside in my backyard and listen. The kids are in school, out at recess, dancing and running like I used to. It’s eerie, really. I live so close to the school that if I listen carefully, I can hear their screams and laughter as they cavort on the playground equipment carried on the December air. The sound mixes with the leaves, kicking them up and harmonizing with the dead sound of rustling. It’s like listening to memories. I could cry in that moment, then. I could cry and feel my past like a stone around my neck. No, a feather more like, brushing against my skin in a taunting sort of way.

It’s scary. Childhood was so short. Adolescence, I suppose, will end just as quickly. Soon, I will be an adult. And then what?

Gone.

I love winter.

I love how the earth stands so still. You can feel yourself spinning if you hold your breath long enough. Long enough to realize how slow and fast everything is all at once. Long enough to break your heart and mend it, too.

I love how, when the sky clouds, the night isn’t black. It’s a sort of blue, a sort of violet shade of evening. A grey shadow, like the ground inverted up above. And when the clouds lift, the moon and stars are so vibrant and poignant you feel like it could cut you like the point of a knife if you looked long enough.

The stars are shaking on your windowsill and the clouds are coming out of your lungs. You’re a part of the landscape, a night bird, a snowflake, a hopeless wish riding on the wings of dusk.

Winter, winter, winter…even the word is beautiful. Sharp, just like the first inhale of cold air. Soft like the hush of snow that blankets the ground.

It’s everywhere nowadays. I feel like crying and laughing just to think about it.

I feel so strange tonight.

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I want to go back to the city.

I want to stand on a street corner and watch the people pass. I want to listen to every breaking sound as it rides the wind. I want to walk aimlessly through the North Side and watch the slate-grey lake crash on the beach. I want to run my hands over the bricks of old buildings and take elevators to the tops of new ones. I want to sit on the vast green by the concert shell in Millennium Park. I want to dangle my feet in the cool sigh that is Buckingham Fountain. I want to window shop for things I’ll never need on Michigan Avenue. I want to rub elbows with a stranger on a rush hour red line train. I want to watch the Navy Pier fireworks burst like a lost memory across the dark brow of the sky. I want to watch the burnt glow of the lights hovering around the skyscrapers, eating into the darkness like a secret.

I want to feel my city in every way. I want every detail, every aspect, every momentary gleam it offers. I’m greedy with this city of mine. I want it all.

Sometimes I write paragraphs of complete irrelevance just to pass the time.

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And so begins the witching hour.

It comes but twice a year.

When the day before the daylight savings time change occurs and the day of the change meet, there is an hour where it is like the thirteenth hour. It’s the zero hour.

I don’t know if I’m making any sense, but if you think about it, this hour we’re in can not be considered today, nor can it be considered yesterday. Today consists of rolling the clock back one hour. But if you go back an hour, you’re in yesterday, and today is tomorrow, which cannot be.

So we are left in a state of suspended animation. Everything and nothing. Today, tomorrow, and yesterday.

Anything can happen.

When I fall in love, I want it to be a love like theirs. A love one simply stumbles upon, be it by fate or chance, who can say. A love that preys on the smallest moments, like the tremble of a lip; the way his smile looked in the moonlight; the last note of a song; that instance where your hearts clicked and suddenly, you weren’t alone anymore. A love that cannot be diffused, not after a broken date, not after 11 years, not ever. A love that lasts. A love that is, quite frankly, cinematic and rather far-fetched.

Who am I kidding. This love doesn’t exist. But wouldn’t it be lovely if it did?