It’s October and the changing season. The temperature is dropping, the days shortening, and life is beginning to still a little after the lively summer. The country appears to leap into collective fight or flight mode, individuals recalling the worst of their winter blues and disseminating their anxieties, like mycorrhizal fungi communicating under damp earth.
Over the last few weeks, my friend Maddy and I have been making what might only be called panic plans, determinedly conjuring up wholesome winter activities to keep us occupied over the next 6 months – various forms of crafting, gigs, sea swims, dinners; all at regular intervals. However, I see now these conversations were more about settling the slight unease that comes with seasonal change; in fact, the winter season in Bristol (where we both now live), though cold and grey, provides gifts not afforded by summer – not consolation prizes, but opportunities to live a more varied and interesting life.
This thought occurred to me at a gig last week, listening to a very wise Gambian man play the kora and give some honest - if a little brutal - life advice around having children (I did say it’s a great city!). I said to James swaying next to me, a big grin slapped on his face: “You know I really love Winter”. This gig came off the back of seeing four films at the cinema in two weeks, some alone and some with friends; two of which moved me to tears, one of which made me feel physically sick, but all of which took me to one of my favourite spaces and made me think. The summer season is for being outdoors, drinking tinnies in the park, listening to music, having BBQs with friends and talking silly. Undoubtedly, some of the best times. However, in winter, there’s more time to think and remind yourself what really makes you tick; to absorb snippets of wisdom that you’ll likely forget on the surface, but that will seep under your skin and slowly alter the way you see things – if you let them.
After articulating some version of this to James, he recommended I read Wintering by Katharine May. I read it over two days, in my time off between jobs. Though it touches on celebrating the best of winter – reading, cooking, big socks – and reflects on the physical harshness of the season, it is mostly a rumination on the periods of life in which we, as humans, “winter”.
“Winters”, as in the book, are those times in which we’re forced to break patterns due to some life-altering event; significantly, those periods in which we’re at our lowest. We’re forced to curl up, go inside ourselves, just as a dormouse hibernates during the cold months. We stop putting energy into presenting to the world, as a tree drops its leaves or a house plant simply stops – not growing or dying but using all energy just to exist. She reflects on the importance of accepting these periods of wintering; of giving up on the idea that happiness can always be manifested, and that these downward turns are our own failure. As the seasons show us, life is cyclical; vitally, it is often in the dark that we learn, and from which springs positive change.
For Katharine May, these periods of wintering are for the most part put upon us, and can happen at any time of year. Yet, the winter season does often bring about lower moods – a body’s physical response to the lack of sunlight. However, what if we turned this on its head and reaped the potential benefits of the colder, slower season with a voluntary wintering? Time to reset, break routines, learn, and look after ourselves; not to mention warm soup with crusty bread, wood-burning fires, candles, big duvets, cosy hats; time to read, knit, write... We shouldn’t need to be pushed to the edge to recharge and become a little introspective.
In my week between jobs, I’ve come to Trealy Farm – perhaps the ideal place to winter away. There’s just something in the air - the old farmhouse and scattered accommodation, unassumingly settled in the Welsh countryside. I say unassumingly, because despite the lovely natural pool and infrared sauna, it is homey, relaxed, and unpretentious. I find a sense of calm here, with nothing to do but read, write, think, and swim. This morning, I walked through the woodlands and across the fields, as the sun came and went away, endlessly excited by the multitude of different mushrooms.
We don’t know what challenges the next day, week, month, season, could bring, and in what place we’ll be to face them; a little happy reset can only be a good thing. So, for the few days given, I’ll embrace this winter; I’ll read well into the morning in bed, I’ll tip-tap away on my laptop, eat nuts and dark chocolate, drink cups of good coffee, and wear my favourite woolly knits; I’ll walk in nature, listen to my body, stretch, be slow, all cosied up in my little pod in the woods.
For the book: Wintering — KATHERINE MAY (katherine-may.co.uk).
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