It's over, Winter! It's over.

I don’t know why you’re forcing me to write this all down. We could have ended this gracefully. It didn’t have to come to this. When you snuck your way back into my life last fall, I told myself it would be different this time; that you would be different this time. I foolishly looked forward to the new outfits: the tights, the wool turtlenecks and the sweaters. I bought myself a new hat and gloves - black with accents of hot pink. I tried to make myself cute for you because you’d laid yourself out at my feet in all of your alabaster beauty. I briefly thought your crispness and your indifference were a refreshing change from that clinging Summer. But now I realize that you aren’t any different. You’re exactly as you’ve always been and I just can’t deal with you anymore.

You could have left gracefully two weeks ago. We both knew then it was over. When you’d worn your way through my favourite wool mittens, and had pierced holes in my shiny pink gloves, you had to know I was losing interest in you. And yet you persisted. You tried to make yourself beautiful again. You draped the city in another white blanket and you dropped your flakes seductively all around me. But now it is I who has grown indifferent to you. And look at you now. You’re a disgrace. You are completely sullied. You’re dirty around the edges and your pretty flakes have turned into sharp points of ice. You’ve turned to slush in some areas and into treacherous patches of ice in others. No one thinks you are pretty now. And what’s worse, you’ve taken the city with you. You’ve turned its sidewalks into hazardous zones and you’ve cast a gray pall over everyone and everything.

I didn’t want to have to end this with any grand statements. I would have liked us to go our separate ways without demeaning ourselves but I see that you refuse to accept the truth. What did you think was happening when I was gazing at those flirty spring clothes? Couldn’t you tell I was ready to move on? Didn’t you hear me shouting in frustration that all I longed for was to leave the house in the shoes I would wear all day? You knew I was really talking about you. That what I was really saying is that I’m tired of you; that we are through. And yet you chose to persist. You’re still here. But now you’ve made yourself pathetic and I think you know you can’t woo me anymore. It’s over, Winter. You must accept this. Acknowledge defeat. Go away now and don’t bother me. Don’t call. Don’t write. Don’t send me long letters professing your love. Just fade away. Perhaps someday, we can be together again. Perhaps I’ll forget the depths to which you’ve allowed yourself to sink. Maybe, when you come back, I won’t be here. But for now, I think we both just need some space.