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“When he got back to Moscow it was beginning to look like winter.”
Here, Chekhov informs the reader that a significant amount of time has passed because the summer weather that Anna and Dmitri enjoyed in Yalta has transitioned into winter. It is additionally significant that the rest of the story is set in winter because winter is often symbolically linked to death in literature, and this complements Dmitri’s contemplation of his own mortality.
“He moved over and took her by the shoulders, intending to fondle her with light words, but suddenly he caught sight of himself in the lookingglass. His hair was already beginning to turn grey. It struck him as strange that he should have aged so much in the last few years. The shoulders on which his hands lay were warm and quivering. He felt a pity for this life, still so warm and exquisite, but probably soon to fade and droop like his own.”
This line, which occurs towards the very end of the story, is Dmiti’s most explicit contemplation of aging and mortality. He is surprised by his graying appearance and he even preemptively mourns Anna’s lost youth as well. The realization causes Dmitri to realize that he is in love for the first time in his life. This epiphany saddens Dmitri just as much as it endears him because he feels that he has wasted so much of life without knowing what it is to love and be loved.
