Winter Closet

Barbara: I know I complain about the weather. I haven’t really hidden the fact that I’m fussy

that way, have I? I’ve harrumphed about the cold, the damp, the rain, the snow, here and to everyone else that will listen (even to Deb who will have none of it!). I can make peace with it, but still it’s the lack of sun and air that I find hard to navigate with good mood intact.

Okay, THAT SAID, I have to admit that I take a bit of a guilty-pleasure every Jan 1^st because that’s when I really look forward to a few months of isolated hibernation … during which I can write, write, WRITE!!!

I mean, obviously I write year-round. It is my escape, my reward, my pleasure, my pain, my job, my obsession. There are so many stories and SO LITTLE TIME!! But there’s something about hunkering in for a long haul that has winter-respite written all over it. Like an endless snow day where the reward isn’t cocoa and TV, but disappearing into warrens of stories too complex to see the light of a summer day, too delicate to be interrupted for walks or gardening or the chores necessary for greeting guests. Winter (after the holidays) is not usually a time for greeting guests. That honour goes to lazy warm days and nights.

So for me, winter has come to mean the glory of a good long cold-induced REVEL. A revel of creating and discovering. Of editing and re-editing. Then editing again. Of polishing and spit-shining and high-gloss-waxing. It is a time like no other for me to allow myself to “just do it”. Yeah, I said “allow”, but that’s because there is a certain surrender involved and surrender is only truly delicious when you don’t always GET TO give in to it. At least that’s how I feel.

Writing is my silk purse out of the sow’s ear that is winter. You?

Deb: And that is exactly what I was talking about when I discussed the weather and people complaining about it. So I am very glad you have your silk purse to get you through. As you know, my thing is to not sit in the bad feelings.  I simply refuse to be unhappy and complain when I know that every single thing I complain or feel badly about has good side. My goal is to always try to find that good side. Now I confess that with winter I did not turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse, as winter is a frosted silk purse to me. But I am thrilled that you have found its gift for you!!!