Friday Ramble - Shelter

Shelter's a word dear to a cronish heart when winter arrives. When daylight hours wane, I retreat to tottering stacks of books, lighted candles, shawls, mugs of hot stuff and a comfy chair. At dusk, I pull the draperies closed, plump up the pillows, put on the kettle and tune out the cold and the darkness beyond the windows.

In its present form, this week's word has been around since the late sixteenth century, possibly coming from the Middle English sheltroun, sheltron or sheldtrume and Old English scyldtruma or scield, all forms meaning shield or protector. The most likely Proto-Indo-European (PIE) root form is skel meaning “to cut". Early shelters were likely assembled from military shields fitted closely together, and the earliest shields in use would have been rounded plates of wood.  The origins of our word are disputed by linguistic scholars, but there is no doubt that shelter and shield are inextricably linked. 

A shelter is an enclosure of some sort, a cabin, a cave or a hollow, an embracing tree or thicket, a harbor shielded by guardian hills and out of the sea wind. We all have our shelters and sanctuaries, and their shapes and trappings are highly personal. For deer and wild turkeys, it's the protection and nourishment afforded by woodland cedar groves in winter. For hibernating bears, it's the secluded leaf-strewn dens where they sleep through the long white season. For rabbits and hares, it's snug burrows in the earth and the overhanging branches of evergreens shielding them from icy temperatures and the rapt attention of predators. For me, it's a fire burning on the hearth and my red shawl, a mug of Earl Grey or chai, a big fat book (better still a stack) and a comfortable chair. 

One does whatever she has to do to drive the dark away, or at least hold it at bay for a while. Hours are spent dreaming up beakers of steaming goodness, and everything brewed up seems to contain little moons of fragrant orange, clove nubbins, cinnamon sticks, cardamom pods or anise stars, sometimes all at once. A flagon of tea always lifts my spirits, and posing creations on the sideboard is a labour of love. I season my potions with abandon and stir them deosil (clockwise) with a wand of rosemary from the pot in my kitchen. The mother plant once lived in my herb garden, now sleeping and blanketed in frost. A small evergreen plant of the mint family, Salvia rosmarinus is native to the Mediterranean and does not overwinter outside this far north. It will have to be planted again in the spring. 

In the dusky weeks between now and Yule, I turn ever inward and find myself thinking about the tiny flame at the heart of things, its tender bloom promising warmth, sunlight and longer days somewhere up the trail, if we can only hang on. Alas, there are many weeks to go before the light returns, at least noticeably so. After December 21st, days will begin to lengthen again, but we will be well into the new year before the change is apparent. Thank Herself for tea and books and warm socks!