“Winter in Maine can be tough as it is, but the reality of another pandemic winter has many of us battening down our psychological hatches and bracing for the worst. This year, I decided to lean in and take winter as it comes. All of it. That’s why Dana Wilde’s ‘Winter: Notes and Numina from the Maine Woods’ was at my bedside these last few months. With a sprawling but accessible mix of anecdote, science, ancient wisdom and wit, ‘Winter’ guides the reader through five main sections named for our winter months: November through March. Each section is broken into smaller essays, which I took to reading at night when all was quiet, then falling asleep with Wilde’s philosophical musings spinning out in the darkness.

“One of my favorite sections perfectly articulates what Mainers believe to be true about the passage of time in winter: ‘Complicated thermophysical calculations developed by me over a long accumulation of frigid January mornings reveal that each 1 unit of time according to a winter calendar is equivalent to 18 units of time in your mental experience of it. So for example, the thermopsychal distance from January 1 to April 1 is 4 ½ years. In mid-January, spring will be here in approximately four years.’

“This book has been a warm comfort these last few months; a needed reminder that we’ve been here before. This is Maine. This is winter. It feels like forever, but we’ll eventually make it to the thaw.” — MIKE BOVE, Portland

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Mainers, please email to tell us about the book on your bedside table right now. In a paragraph or two, describe the book and be sure to tell us what drew you to it. We want to hear what you are reading in these unsettled times and why. Send your selection to pgrodinsky@pressherald.com, and we may use it as a future Bedside Table.

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