Go. Commodores.

I really, really like breath mints, Listerine, and menthol cigarettes. (And also animal crackers but that's not really relevant.) I do not like them for the way they make my breath smell or for the way they make my head feel. I like them for that weird, refreshing, almost unexplainable "cold" feeling. You know? Try taking in a big breath of air after having a few Certs; you'll love it!

This may explain why I like the cold so much. I mean, besides having more fashion options (Layers, my friend, layers!), why would anyone prefer a cold day over a warm one? Or a 70 degree, throw-frisbee-in-the-park day? I will answer that question with another one: how freakin sweet is it to see your breath?

As I waited on a friend tonight, I stood outside on Western's chilly campus with my hood pulled over my head and my hands deep in my pockets, and desperately tried to locate the hiding stars. After a few moments, I sighed, and there it was, the coolest, most unusual, fleeting sight: my own breath. I don't claim to know much about physical science (is that even the right term?), but I'm pretty sure that when we humans breathe we take in a little oxygen and then when we breathe out we give back a little carbon dioxide. I think that's how it works. Anyway, it is the queerest of things, breathing. We do it, what, thousands, millions of times a day? And you can go weeks or months without once ever thinking to make yourself breathe. I think that would suck if we always had to go around thinking about when we should breathe.

So, breathing. It keeps us alive, somehow. I would research it, but I really don't want to. I trust that God knows EXACTLY how it works and in fact it's so easy for Him that He didn't even think it was that big of a deal when he BREATHED it into existence. Couple lungs, a diaphragm, and a little oxygen, no big deal. But there were some other things God kind of breathed into existence, too. By speaking (is speaking not just breathing with a little noise?), God Himself gave light to the sun (a pretty crazy thought in its own right), created all the stars, and then made all kinds of wild animals and whales and sharks and birds.

I wonder, though, when He created Air. It could be in Genesis 1:6-8, when Moses writes that God created an "expanse" (Eugene Peterson calls it "sky" in The Message). I'll take Peterson's word for it, that God created Sky, thus enabling his soon-to-be-created plants, animals, and humans to breathe.

You know how people say sometimes that when there's lightning bolts God's throwing them or when there's thunder God's bowling or when there's rain God's crying? I don't necessarily believe those (although a bolt-hurling God is appealing to me), but I do believe that the wind--heck, even just stagnant air--is the breath of God. He clearly breathed this universe into creation, and what can air be, after all, if it is not the actual breath of God? The sensation and awe of inhaling God's actual breath is experienced in a rather amazing way when it is cold. The cold air on the back of my throat seems to refresh me, and always ends up reminding me of the simplicity and necessity of breathing. God's way of reminding us that, Hey, I'm here, you're breathing My breath.

Then we exhale. When its cold (again, the best time to take a big, fat, deep breath), we can actually see our breath. I have no clue how to explain it and all I can do is watch it. As soon as we start to breathe out (our breath), our exhale pollutes God's breathing out (His breath). Perhaps this is why we can see it. I tried and tried tonight to get my warm breaths to stay in the cool air for more than two seconds, but dadgum it my breaths were just too small, too insignificant.

I bet the reason that we can't see the wind and the gentler breezes and the stagnant air is that the wind and breeze and air is the never-ending breath of God. The overpowering, overflowing breath of God that is so huge it cannot be seen. Our breaths are allowed to be viewed as long as we understand that we'll get to see our breaths for 1.2 seconds before they vanish again. God's breath is not something that is meant to be seen, to be looked at, to be captured in a pretty little picture. It's more like something that wants to be felt. I think God might like cold nights too.