Last year, I was rummaging through a used bookstore to see what titles would catch my eye. Somewhere among the endless titles was the author Alice Munro, whose Pulitzer Prize-winning anthology “Something I’ve Been Meaning to Tell You” was staring back at me. With curiosity, I bought it with intent on seeing if there was something about her prose that spoke to me. With phenomenal blurbs on the back, I’ve taken up the challenge of working my way through these pages to see if I have found a new favorite. Given that she has a fascination with time and interpersonal relationships, I’m sure this will be a fulfilling journey. The only way to find out is to dive right in.
With “The Spanish Lady,” Munro found a way to turn the everyday into something spiritual, turning divorce into a cosmic ordeal that could’ve spawned generations. More importantly, it was a story caught between two points of a woman’s life, creating awareness of how time changes someone. While “Winter Wind” isn’t necessarily as supernatural in its subtext or even all that indirect, it does continue the trend of finding a protagonist caught between two places: home and the town. Along with this, she finds different parts of her family attracting her to each corner. The question about where she is happiest centers the story, finding layers that go in every direction, including inward, to present a complicated vision. Where is one happiest? Like all of these stories, Munro’s answer isn’t as simple as A or B.
The title alludes to the stifling nature of freedom. During winter months, travel becomes more difficult and the chances of regional cities, including Munro’s own, becoming snowed in increases tenfold. There is an uncertainty with winter months if you’ll be stuck somewhere you don’t want to be. It’s paralyzing, creating a strategy on whether leaving home is worth it. If you are unfortunate, the path back is likely to grow perilous and cause a disconnect to form. Given that winter also leads to frostbite which has the potential to destroy one’s body, the issue of safety becomes baked into the subtext of the piece. How can one truly run away when chances of finding shelter aren’t guaranteed, let alone if you see your family as being warm and welcoming during the cold season?
For me personally, a “snow day” seems unfathomable in Southern California. The weather has never been terrible enough to compromise somebody’s schedule. However, it makes sense in Munro’s world where the thought of wind picking up can cause a Chemistry class to experience massive change. The uncertainty rises. Part of it is the joy of not being able to return home, but it’s also the reality that in town is her grandmother and great aunt, who needs her assistance. She is helpful and will do her best to make their waning years better. As she watches her grandmother fall to failing health, there is something sad about going to town. The sight of watching someone die is nobody’s idea of a good time, and given her teenage years she’s wasting them seeing a world in decline. How does that shape one’s view and create an understanding of what it means to be strong?
There’s nobility in taking care of others. It becomes clear that her great aunt also agrees with this idea. Like previous stories, she is a matriarch of sorts, having to fulfill roles that nobody else will. The male figures of the family are absent, leaving women behind to fend for themselves. The protagonist is able-bodied and uses her powers for good, breaking from the idea that a teenager must rebel and find their own identity. She becomes trapped in a tradition that affects women especially. Even as she looks for an education that will expand her chances of a career that allows her to escape, it’s still family that’s holding her back. By accident, her elderly relatives need her and it may impact her grades. While the snow outside may be limiting her physically, mentally the thought of letting her sick grandmother suffer in her waning years weighs on her, creating an interesting struggle.
In the town, she is free. There’s so much more going on there. She has school and access to a greater world. However, it’s also one where her freedom is trapped in the past. When confronting her grandmother and great aunt, she is struggling to find a connection with them. The decades hold them back from a convenient focus. Even then, she looks at photographs and finds these clues that will hopefully explain what meaningful things they have done in their lives. With the protagonist's future seemingly ahead of her, there is a need for guidance from lessons learned as the culture has changed and she’s suddenly faced with having to evolve into her own person. She thinks that she understands family, but what exactly is being expressed in this story?
This is contrasted with her own story of youth and the struggle to feel like she belongs at home. The relationship with her mother isn’t exactly warm, but it does come with a few advantages. She may be far from an educated world full of forward momentum, but she has the freedom to express herself how she wants. She can test her limits and go on adventures. Even with this in mind, she feels trapped because home is a metaphorically juvenile place. She cannot be stuck there forever, as it implies immobility. She must keep moving forward and find new ways to evolve as a person. It may come at the expense of disastrous weather that may paralyze or even kill her, but there’s so much pressure for the two women to relate.
With all of this in mind, the question then becomes how much is being discussed within this framework. The reader can be forgiven for thinking that it’s straightforward and lacking major symbolism. Compared to “The Spanish Lady,” it feels stripped down, mostly relying on one’s interpretation of snow. I once read James Joyce’s “The Dead” and had a teacher suggest that snow was the start of new life where I saw it as a burial cloth. In the case of Munro, I still imagine that to be caught in the storm is to risk suffering health. The protagonist cannot handle that right now, not when her grandmother needs her or when she has so much potential ahead of her. As a result, she is forced to make the most of wherever she is stuck.
From an external standpoint, it’s easy to understand that the protagonist is trying to be strong and confident. The effort to present her best self to others comes naturally. If she appears strong, it can work as a confidence booster for her grandmother. At home, she’s allowed to let loose and find her inner self, where she’s vulnerable and messy in ways that may not be fully understood, but show the complexity of self. Even if everyone in this story tries to understand each other, there’s still something guarded about them that keeps a greater truth from emerging. What is there is the fact that nobody will be able to understand everything. Home may be a place where one feels restricted, but it’s also where the true self is free to be something more.
Munro is a fan of exploring duality within various themes. In this case, she falls back on the idea of life holding this greater meaning. It is seen in how youth and the elderly are codependent on each other for survival, where women are often thrust into roles of motherhood even if they don’t want it. Even the idea of escape is difficult because some paths may be cut back. If she’s trapped in town, she may be unable to find the safety of home even if she seems happier away from it. There is a need for these complicated themes to correlate and find the true identity of self within a family. Like the snow itself, the haze can be overwhelming and create visual impairments. In the case of one character, a walk in the snow can even be deadly. How does one break free of this messaging and find something more authentic?
I think that it helps that this was written in a way resembling a memoir. While every story so far has been written in first person, they have owed some fluctuation. Not everything falls into a convenient order. Sometimes it’s even misdirecting the reader down some innocuous paths. With “Winter Wind,” it’s a journey into the self that makes sense on the surface, but is full of doubt underneath. Munro does an excellent job of creating an understanding of characters and motivations, but the reader is ultimately left with figuring out what greater goals they all have. Why do they put up with each other when there’s certain divisiveness among every demographic?
The chances of this being derived from Munro’s own life seem evident, especially given that they focus on a fairly common familial dynamic. She had a sick mother whom she had to take care of. Having lived in Canada, she was also familiar with snow storms and the pressure it can put on survival. While I’m sure it’s nowhere near as harrowing as the fiction of Jack London’s “To Build a Fire,” there’s still the reality that even if snow brings everything to a stop, the world will continue spinning. The need to take care of each other will never go away and at most one will have guilt for what they can’t achieve. Efforts to move forward must remain consistent even if it’s not entirely clear how.
“Winter Wind” is another solid story from a very good anthology. I personally think that Munro has continually found ways to explore the female identity in its diversity. While there are several characters in this book who have similar mindsets, they never go on the same journey. Everyone follows their own path and soon they’re left with new revelations. “Winter Wind” may fall under more ambiguous answers, but it’s not a cop-out. There’s a lot of interesting parts to piece through and find a greater truth not only about the characters, but of one’s self. It’s what the best of fiction can do and I sincerely believe that Munro is one of the best to have done it. While this isn’t my favorite, I love how she makes the mundane into something greater, making you stop to reconsider your own perception of life. This is a prime example.
Coming Up Next: "Memorial"
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