missing the winter d'autre fois....

That night the fresh, sweet and mild air was like the one they used to breathe while in one of the small villages scattered among hills and valleys. It was not the air of oncoming spring, but of winter, quite surprisingly a pre-Christmas winter. It reminded her a lot of long time ago, when she used to spend her winterholidays somwhere near the mountains with her grandparents. It smelled like burnt wood, smoke playfully coming out of chimneys. It smelled of people chattering around the fire, of women preparing traditional meals, of men talking over a glass of moonstone of the "serious" matters of the village, of kids anxiously expecting the next day sledging.
It was night, winter, after a several days snow....now it had stoppedand a freezing cold was conquering the village and its surroundings. Everything was so white and so light; in spite of the dark night outside all things seemed to have an inner light of their own. And everything was so frozen that almost all noises- footsteps on snow, gates being opened and then closed- almost sounded like broken ice.
Here and there some lonely dog was barking out loud its miserable life. Others always answered, closer and more distant, all joined by a clear cold echo.
That night there were lights in the sky- a huge bright moon and her billion little sisters must be having a ball...
Everything is so clear and fresh in her memory as if it all happened this last Christmas....and yet entire years passed by like eagles in their flight. The same SHE was trying to find the same sky, to grasp the same air, feeling like then. Only the faint breeze of air "d'autant" was present... The light of the earth were more powerful than those in the sky, the fragrances around her were stronger than those of the nature in winter. She was surrounded by parfumes and exquisite flavours; the cigarette smoke and the expesive drinks were invading her, sometimes the air becoming so heavy and overwheming that it almost choked her.
The infatuated laughters, the innuendo, the mean gossip floating within the room were almost hurting...she was wondering: "why hasn't anyone invented the time machine yet?"....
And she was at Aspen....