The Horror of Winter
In a sharp left turn from my previous advent post, and at the risk of sounding like a Scrooge, I'd like to talk to you about horror. It's not the first thing on everyone's mind during the holiday season, but it is if you're a freak like me.
I grew up in the U.S., where Christmas is the holiday of the year, next to Halloween, so it's inevitable to compare the two. See The Nightmare Before Christmas, or people calling Halloween "gay Christmas", or the fact that these are the only two holidays that people seem to go all out on their decorations (and general spending) for. They're always positioned as opposites, where Christmas is the cheery one and Halloween is the grim one. I want to push back on that. Halloween is a celebration of the exciting kind of terror you feel on a roller coaster, but Christmas takes place during Winter: the season of the slow, contemplative horror of a colorless landscape and a lengthening night.
Although I was initially inspired to write this post by Nosferatu (2024), which is my favorite movie in recent memory and takes place primarily during Winter, I've thought that Winter was the most dreadful season (literally, full of dread) for as long as I can remember. The most obvious reason is the dangerous weather conditions and dying foliage. The less obvious reason is that Winter always puts us in an uncomfortable, transitional state.
Winter forces us inside, into close confines with others and with ourselves. We are made by annual traditions to mark the passage of time and therefore notice how things have changed and how they haven't, who is here and who isn't.1 We know we will emerge again in the Spring, as everything does, but how? Will we have changed? If we haven't, could we accept that?
I think that this is part of the reason that A Christmas Carol still resonates with us today. Visitations from spirits are inevitable this time of year. You may see yourself as a child, you may wonder what others will see when you're gone, and you may imagine friends and family that have passed still sitting by your side.2 The continuity of traditions brings into contrast all the things that have become something new, and nothing is quite as scary as something new: that thing which we don't yet know.
We can't forget that Winter is the threshold to the New Year: the ultimate unknown that is the future. Sure, every day is unknown (my anxiety won't let me forget that), but this is different. We have marked this time of year as the checkpoint between two units of time, which, we are reminded, is still marching forward. We can't ignore that any longer.
Still, I am a perpetual optimist, in spite of... pretty much everything. I can't end on a bleak note in good conscience. As dark as Winter gets, it's inevitably followed by Spring (And Summer and Fall and Winter again). There is sometimes a comfort in the constant that is change, and even if there isn't now, there may be later. So if you see any ghosts this time of year, don't worry, that's normal. You can take comfort either in the fact that they'll be gone in the morning, or that they'll visit again soon.
Notes
I first realized this after hearing it either from You're Wrong About or You are Good. I don't remember which, or which episode, I just remember Sarah Marshall saying something about it, and I wanted to credit her.↩
You may find yourself living in a shotgun shack. You may find yourself in another part of the world. And you may ask yourself, well, how did I get here?↩