Red Filter, originally uploaded by Gerald Rich.

There’s a sense of nihilism that enshrouds everything like the silence of a freezing winter morning.

No one wants to move; cars even huddle together in their garages.

Life feels different. In the summer heat, soaked in humid joy, you can feel constant movement. Everyone is doing something.

But when you’re numbed from the cold, there’s no desire to do anything other than curl up.

People’s faces are even contorted by the cold. Hairless monkeys stand around gaping — their noses reddened the chilled air filling their nostrils. Instead they remain slack jawed as the life escapes out of them in white puffs.

Should we even be here, stagnantly goggling in the frigid frost of discontent?