I love winter, but heading into February everything always just seems difficult. I think this is the hang-on time of the year, the keep-plodding time, the let’s-just-do-what-we-can-even-though-we-are-all-worn-out, passing-illnesses-from-person-to-person time of year.
This is the time of year I intentionally look for ways to fight discouragement. This is the time, especially, to cling to read-alouds, and art supplies that take over a room, and new projects of all sorts. Oh, and living room bacchanals—I hope my kids are never too old for those. They are the only people on this earth who have ever seen me dance wildly, and so far they are still quite tolerant. I have literally taken to writing manifestos for myself the last few years, not because I’m so good at handling the long stretches of darkness, but because I need to remind myself of how to fight the urge to turn inward completely. So I thought I’d share, just in case you are feeling a bit battle-weary yourself:
Seek out warmth and light and wrap yourself in it.
Then look for somebody else to wrap.
Fill your head with music.
Stop saving the good stuff for special occasions.
Enjoy your food as if you were still a child.
Dance like a maniac.
Pile on everything beautiful and hang on for spring.
Defy the darkness with beauty. Recklessly, if necessary.
And you? What would you add? Is it February, or another time of year for you?
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