clearly canadian

There is something deeply annealing about true winter weather--and having been raised on it year-after-year for a total sum that can be described in decades. And not just personally annealing. It forms inter-personal bonds, which in turn beget communities, the dynamics of which beget this nebulous thing we call sometimes call culture and sometimes call society. (Those unafraid of being labeled "new age" often dare to call it the collective consciousness.) And all of this is then turned around again into stamping the individual with a unique blend of self-identity (that as we all know, is not exactly entirely self-formed).

This is not a strand of humanity that can be learned after the fact, or through stories or any sort of second-hand interaction. This is a you've-either-got-it-or-you-don't type thing.