Slow down

The Blessing of Hygge

Leave a comment

It was quiet when I woke up — Husband was still asleep beside me, and neither Kiddo nor my mother had stirred out of their rooms yet. Not even the cat was at my door yet. So I decided to take advantage. I slipped out of the bedroom and downstairs for a much-needed hygge morning. I made some coffee, gathered my books, journals, and pens, put some comforting ambiance on TV, and slipped on a new, comfy sweater. Then I settled in to contemplate some simple but beautiful things.

I love the pen I have been writing with lately. It’s a Uniball Air, exhumed from the depths of one drawer or bag or another, and I have been re-discovering just how much I adore it! I don’t know what it is about the construction of these particular pens, but they feel so…dainty yet controlled. It reminds me of someone in China or Japan writing the most delicate characters with just the tip of their brush. Such control and skill! That’s what these pens feel like to me. It as though I am using the daintiest tool yet executing my writing with such elegance, though a different type of elegance entirely from, say, a fountain pen. Needless to say, I ordered more.

When the pen I am writing with feels beautiful, then the writing I do feels beautiful. When the writing I am doing feels beautiful, then I want to do it more. I love writing longhand and did it so often when I was younger, of course. I would fill notebook after notebook with my stories, all painstakingly handwritten. Nowadays, such a practice almost feels like an indulgence: taking that extra time to handwrite when the world is so often encouraging us to work faster, work quicker, do more. Handwriting takes time, it takes thought, and it takes effort…none of which can be rushed.

As the summer starts to wind down and the school year approaches (*digs a trench around myself*), maybe this is my sign to keep on slowing down. Maybe less, with focused intention and attention, is better than a lot. Maybe I need to be more aware of when I am trying to cram in more when what I and my students need is for me to slow down. So maybe I have accidentally stumbled onto a goal for this year, for myself as well for my classes: to slow down and focus on the dainty and the elegant points that might be missed if I rush onward.

The Work of the Dark

Leave a comment

“Winter reminds us that everyone and everything needs some quiet time.” – Katrina Mayer

Tonight will be the longest night of the year. The long dark while the world makes its turn and tilt towards the light again. Winterdark. I always feel as though I want to mark this night, the beginning of Winter but, at the same time, the eventual advent of Spring and green and warmth. I have no Yule log, my greenery isn’t real. How can I mark the beginning of Winterdark? Moreover, some might ask, why would I want to?

I want to because there is work to be done in the dark, in the cold, and in the barrenness that Winter brings. I have been reading a great deal about the work of Winter. The need for the silence, the stillness, and the bleakness of the season. As a woman raised in perpetual light (ie, the Caribbean) for the first half of my life, this weighs heaviest on me about Winter of all its traits: the darkness. Rising in the dark, driving to work in the dark, being inside during whatever wan light comes during the day, and then, if I stay too late, driving home in the darkness once again. It is often very hard to think of that darkness, that silence, that bleakness as necessary, never mind thinking of it as good. But it is good. 

Just like the trees, the grass, and other plants, we need a pause in life. Growth cannot be continuous; rest is needed. Winterdark is a time for slowing, for pausing, for quieting down. Life doesn’t stop, of course, no. Not at all, but the long dark can remind us of our need for slowness, for catching our breath, and letting our pulse relax for a bit. I am not the best at slowing, pausing, and resting. The past few weeks have been a flurry of must-do’s in order to finish the school semester and all that comes with it before I left the building yesterday. And then there was the Christmas and birthday prep and officially moving my daughter into her new room upstairs. No…I don’t do “slowing down” very well. But I want to.

This Winter, I want to re-learn how to rest and how to embrace the slow and the quiet. I want to learn the work of Winter, the work of the dark, and the restorative properties of dormancy. I want to re-learn quiet. I want to re-learn care. I want to re-learn peace. Beginning tonight with Winterdark, I want to reclaim this season.

Tonight, after the bustle of the day, I will sit, bundled and warm, with husband, mother, and daughter. Then, later, with book and journal and pen. I will sit in the glow of my Christmas tree when the house is finally calm and quiet. I will reclaim and embrace silence and stillness, the work of Winter and the long dark as they begin.

Will you join me?