David Sax’s most recent book is The Future Is Analog: How to Create a More Human World.
“Snow! Mom, Dad, look at the snow!”
It was late afternoon on Nov. 24, and we were driving just north of Barrie, Ont., when our eight-year-old son Ezra spotted a slash of white across the brown farm fields, and shrieked in delight. The temperature was three degrees, it had been raining on and off all weekend, but in this one little pocket enough snow had fallen to stick around for his viewing pleasure. The first of the season.
“Oh wow, it’s all over the houses!” he said, pressing his face against the glass. “I can’t wait to get back to Toronto and build a fort. Have a snowball fight. Do you think we can have hot chocolate tonight?”
Winter had arrived, and he couldn’t have been happier. My son had been asking about snow since the morning after Halloween, fantasizing about it on our walk to school, shifting gears fully to seasonal anticipation.
“This winter is going to be the best Dad. We’re gonna make snow forts and have epic snowball fights and go sledding. Oh and skiing. When does the hill open? Do you think I can do a 360 this year? Am I on the same racing team? Can we sled down our street into the park if they close the roads during a storm? WAIT! Can we SKI down our street if the roads are closed???”
Each day brought more snowy dreams. Ice sculptures. Skating. Hockey games on frozen lakes. Bringing hot apple cider to school in a thermos. Roasting marshmallows in a fireplace. The kid was a nonstop Canadian Tire commercial. All frozen cheer and red-cheeked patriotism. T’will be his season.
His sister, who is 11, was equally as excited in her own way. She started weekly video chats with her ski racing teammates, and would walk around the house, trying on different jackets, toques and accessories.
She described elaborate winter self-care rituals like some fleshy AI image generator for Instagram. Cozy blankets and fur throws, cinnamon matcha cider lattes and curling up to Taylor Swift’s Evermore. The words bougie and aesthetic were definitely used.
Maybe we could learn something from the way kids embrace winter.
Adults suck at winter.
We see it a long, dark, cold, uncomfortable season that we have to endure and survive. The older you get, the harder winter is. It’s the season of sickness and injury. We anticipate pulled muscles and broken bones from ice, ski hills or just an imperfectly cleared sidewalk. Winter is physiotherapy season. And NyQuil.
Winter is also expensive for adults. Jackets, hats, boots, layers for every temperature and occasion and family member. Snow tires, snow mats, shovels and bags of salt you have to track down before a storm. A new furnace, blankets, slippers, teas, skates, skis, sleds and more physio appointments. At least three pairs of mittens per child, because one and a half will be lost by December. So much lip balm.
It’s not always like this. We start out loving winter, spending our first decade anticipating that first snowfall, and all the magic that comes with it. A snow day is the greatest gift from heaven. But sometime in our teens that magic starts to fade, as we trudge to high school in wet sneakers. By the time we rush across a university campus in a January blizzard, trying to make it to class with frozen eyelashes, something starts to harden in us. Spat out into adulthood, we shiver in miserable silence at the bus stop with the rest of the crowd, jamming in for the sweaty ride of frowning faces.
Each decade we age makes winter harder to love. We feel the cold in our marrow. The slightest slip can be crippling. We fantasize about escaping south. The idea of jumping on a sled in a park is ludicrous, if not suicidal.
Since I entered my forties, friends have openly begun talking about how much they hate winter. “I absolutely despise it,” one of them told me recently. It’s not as though winter snuck up on her last year, like she’d just arrived from a tropical island without any sense of geography. She was born in Canada and lived here her whole life. But nearly five centuries of winter made its mark on her soul, and finally crushed her.
Hating winter won’t make it go away, any more than hating darkness will eliminate night. You can hide inside for months, or run off to Florida, but if you live in Canada, winter is your reality for a quarter of the year (or more). Take a note from a kid, and learn to love it.
Children love winter because they only see the positive things about it. They see a coating of slush outside the car window, and immediately think about playing in it. They dive right into snow, regardless of attire or other practical concerns. They just want to have fun before it melts. Adults tend to switch to negative ideas right away. Do I have snow tires? This is going to mess up my commute. How long will it take me to shovel that? These new pants are going to get ruined.
The first lesson to learn from kids about winter is to find the thing you love about it, and just zero in obsessively. For me, that’s always been skiing. There is nothing I love more in life than skiing. Epic powder days in the B.C. backcountry, or ripping icy manmade groomers here in Ontario – they are all great. I start counting the days to my first turn the second I feel that first autumn chill. For three months I scope out new gear, watch ski movies, read magazines and plan trips.
Loving skiing flips the script on winter, right back to childhood. Every weekend and vacation is my recess. Every storm is the best day ever. Each turn brings a smile to my face. I need that, because skiing is a ridiculous sport: insanely expensive, time consuming and dangerous. The amount of dedication it takes to ski regularly is illogical … but I cannot imagine winter without it. It would be joyless.
Find that one thing you can only do in winter that you love, and dive in. Get ambitious. Plan that fort. Book a trip to see the northern lights in the Yukon, cat skiing in the Monashees or to Carnival in Quebec City. Do the things that make winter awesome: pond hockey and forest skating, snowshoeing and cross country skiing, dog sledding, snowmobiling, fat tire biking, cold plunges and polar bear dips … even nighttime walks through an icy city.
The more you enjoy it, the longer you’ll enjoy winter. “Why would I go to Florida?” my father, who is in his seventies, tells his snowbird friends each year. “I’d miss ski season!”
The second lesson kids can teach us about winter is that you have to get outside. Don’t sit around all day watching TV and playing video games. Go out and feel the cold slap of air, the tingle of the nostrils catching icy particles, the dazzle of sharp sunlight after a storm. Move your legs. Get groceries. Walk the dog. Don’t hide from winter. “You have to play in the snow to have fun in winter,” Ezra said recently, in a moment of perfect clarity.
We all experienced this during the pandemic. We happily dined under heat lamps in December, walked with friends in blizzards, played tennis on clear days and went on endless hikes. And we immediately felt better whenever we did anything outside. Do something beyond your front door. You will feel amazing, and will literally tingle when you come back in. Our bodies were made to be outdoors. You’re not a hamster.
Which brings us to lesson three: dress for success. Winter sucks if you’re cold and wet. Parents know that and shout it out the door. Kids learn it real quick.
But if you have a decent barrier against the elements, it’s great. Don’t deny the season with improper footwear and some fashionable coat designed for a moderate Milan February. Don’t bare your midriff like a tween. Layer up, and feel your spine relax as you walk. Properly insulated, waterproof coats. Toques. Mitts. Serious boots that will keep your toes dry and warm.
Fourth, don’t punish yourself. Treat yourself. Kids don’t shoulder on through the misery. They indulge their way into spring. Begin winter with an orgy of holiday indulgence: cookies, chocolates, panettone, parties and fun. Book a vacation somewhere and look forward to it. Dine out. Order in. Go spend an afternoon at the movies, or a spa. Eat all the cheese. Have the things you can only really get away with in winter: fondue, peppermint hot chocolate, pyjamas with woodland creatures. Winter is a time for self-care. Kids go outside on the promise of hot chocolate. You should too. Put that new gym membership to good use.
Finally, enjoy winter while you can, because the season is painfully short. We get three months of it, if we’re lucky. Winters are warmer now, and climate change, sadly, isn’t going anywhere. School closing snowstorms are painfully rare. Skating on a frozen lake is a fading luxury for most of us. Spring is always here sooner than you think, and the snow outside the car window will disappear faster than your childhood.
Two weeks after that brief dusting it finally snowed for real. We drove past those fields in a full on blizzard at night, and the next morning Ezra was putting on his snowsuit after breakfast, swan diving off snowbanks before his sister woke up. We all got out and played for hours. I dug a trench fort, went snowshoeing with a friend and took the kids sledding till my clothes were soaked and my body was spent. That night, sitting on the couch by the fire, Ezra curled up under a blanket, suddenly quiet.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Nothing,” he said, tears pooling in his eyes. “I just miss winter, and it hasn’t even started.”
Grown-up winter
Illustrations by D. McFadzean
