I wish I was a squirrel...

.. or a hedgehog because I’d like to be allowed to hibernate until the spring arrives.

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I’m not very fond of winter; the decreased light causes me to transcend into an almost permanent state of melancholy – sinking within a grey that is as gloomy as a December sky.

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Poetry always seems more difficult during these bitter months, more elusive, and so I tend to read more than I write. There is something comforting, idyllic, romantic even, about reading during the winter: curled up next to a radiator, losing oneself in pages, as the wind growls at the window.

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After moving from Coventry aged nine, I spent the rest of my childhood growing up in a Bedfordshire village on the outskirts of Leighton Buzzard. Winter in this village and around the surrounding area was beautiful. The nearby country park was a mix of coniferous and deciduous trees; firs that would be peaked with white after a flurry and nude oaks painted in morning frosts. There was a lake, which – if the temperature was cold enough – would freeze solid and we’d skim stones across its hardened surface. Each bounce creating a delightful chirp that would send out a chorus of echoes into the browning bracken. And it is that sound, the sound of stone on ice that makes me more forgiving and tolerant of the winter months.

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In a playground we’d puff out our breaths, pretending we were grown-up as we waved around invisible cigarettes above our heads.

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As the snow turns sludgy, the last-made snowman is grubby white, imprinted with twigs, grass and mud. But you’re still proud of it.

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E . A . R . M . U . F . F . S.

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[Probably the most fragmented blog post I've ever written]

Thank you for reading,

Lara