[image: milky-way-winter-sky-stars-wallpaper-preview.jpg]
"Although some might experience this moment despairingly and murmur
lamentations throughout the seemingly  interminable solstice night, others
greet it with jubilation.   Now, at this  precise moment, Earth's north
pole has shied away from the Sun as much as it ever will.   The following
moment, however, will initiate the pole's gradual but inexorable return
toward the  summer solstice, when our hemisphere will once again  nod
reverently toward its parent star.  For now, however, we begin our  annual
excursion through the winter world which, though quiescent, is not dead,
but merely dormant.  From the persistent evergreens to distant wolf howls
life persists.  From the unbounded starfields reflected on lake ice to the
scarcely audible splash  of water under that ice, energy abounds.  So, take
heart and move forward:  every crunching footstep onto the crystalline
snowscape will take you back toward the realm of the Sun."