There are places that are beautiful in any season or in any weather.  Well-groomed gardens, nature's magnificent mountains, canyons that were carved by glaciers but now eternally reflect the orange glow of the sun and exude warmth.  These places end up on postcards and calendars, and sometimes on Christmas cards. They fit the commonly held concept of natural beauty.

I get a lot of Christmas cards.  I am ashamed to say I never send any, but that is my peculiarity and for some reason forgiven by most (which I think is rather decent of them and in-keeping with the general holiday spirit).

I love the artwork on Christmas cards.  There is always a peaceful winter scene, golden light shines from windows onto soft, rolling drifts of snow.  The stars glow bright against an azure sky.  We are overcome with beauty and the warmth of home.

Snow. Definitely beautiful.  A snow can transform the most ordinary spot into something you wish you could paint.  Or put on a Christmas card.

But how about a couple of days later?  What about when the plows have made high walls that line the streets, and sand and salt spray from the wheels of passing vehicles have splattered them brown and black like old and dingy paint that needs a fresh coat?  What about when the delicate lacy edging on tree branches and the hollow tubing of long-dead vegetation has been stripped by bitter winds, leaving nothing but gnarled and angry fingers pointing at a sun that lends no warmth by its shining? Does anyone want to paint this?

I do.

Winter transforms the world daily.  It grants it beauty, takes the earth as its young bride and bedecks it in white; fresh and clean, a sparkling vision.  But the course of winter, like that of life, makes no guarantee of eternal beauty and peace.  It teases with a rise in the thermometer, it slaps down optimism with the cold wind of its hand, it rains down pebbles of ice and chases the blood from your fingertips.

I love the indecision of winter in New England.  I love the way it  pushes and punishes with arctic blasts, pummels the  body and spirit until in a capricious moment, it leaves off its bitter cruelty and lifts its icy roof to allow  the sun and an errant wind to warm and restore.  

Yes, I would like to paint the winter that is not beautiful, the one that reaches an icy finger into your soul and sends the wind to tear its own white coverlet off the shivering trees. I want to paint the muddy slosh of sanded parking lots, the dried salt that leaves a powdered sugar finish on every car, the puckered skin on bloodless hands, robbed of their warmth by subzero temperatures.

Of course, this is December.  Catch me around the third week of February after the 24th snow storm of the season.  I may find it all a little less enchanting.