Winter Mix

Step out the front door like a ghost into the fog
Where no one notices the contrast of white on white
-- Counting Crows, “’Round Here”

Here in Columbus a winter mix means a combination of rain, sleet, and snow. We don’t have real winter, where the rosy-cheeked kids go flying down the snow-covered hills on their sleds, and where the horses pull the sleigh full of happy holiday revelers, like in those Budweiser commercials. We have a winter mix, and this is the third day in a row of that particularly noxious combination of rain, sleet, and snow. A typical day, like today, means 35 degrees and more sleet, changing over to ice and snow toward evening. For what it’s worth, Dante describes this in The Inferno as the predominant weather pattern of the inner circle of hell.

So I’ve put together a music playlist to suit the times. Naturally, I call it the Winter Mix. Here it is.

1. Cold, Haily, Windy Night – Steeleye Span
2. Bare Trees – Fleetwood Mac
3. Sleet – The Futureheads
4. If the World Should End in Ice – The Handsome Family
5. Valley Winter Song – Fountains of Wayne
6. Antarctica Starts Here – John Cale
7. Always Winter But Never Christmas – XTC
8. Tenth Avenue Freezeout – Bruce Springsteen
9. Hazy Shade of Winter – Simon and Garfunkel
10. Ain’t No Sunshine – Bill Withers
11. Song for a Winter’s Night – Gordon Lightfoot
12. January Rain – David Gray
13. Surprise Ice – Kings of Convenience
14. Winterlong – Neil Young
15. Obscured by Clouds – Pink Floyd