Icy Inspiration

So over that art

Which you say adds to nature is an art

That nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marry

A gentler scion to the wildest stock,

And make conceive a bark of baser kind

By bud but of nobler race. This is an art

Which does mend nature–change it rather; but

the art itself is nature.

The Winter’s Tale, 4.4.79

Snowcake

Snowcake on the back deck

It was like driving through Siberia trying to get to my parents’ house from the airport. The South doesn’t really know how to deal with snow, so almost all minor/back roads are still require some sort of army vehicle to navigate. Apparently, Charlottesville literally shut down for two days– literally, the whole city. Silly.

In any case, staying with my parents for Winter Break: it’s good for catching up on sleep, blog posts, and for cuddling near the wood stove. I also have plans for finishing Philip Roth’s American Pastoral, working on my senior thesis, and (gulp) planning a future for after graduation.

I also returned home to a Lamy 2000 on my desk– a belated birthday gift that had finally arrived in the mail. Look for a review, or general pen updates, soon.

Little Good Things in Winter

 

Sunrise from my dorm window

 

Sometimes I think our natural instinct is to curl up and hibernate all winter. It makes sense, and to a certain extent, we are supposed to behave differently during the cold season. We gain weight to help provide some insulation, we feel sleepier because it’s darker, we spend free time curled up in our rooms instead of playing frisbee outside.

Back in November, the campus newspaper published an article on the high incidence of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) among students, to try and warn us as winter was beginning to set in. It turns out that depression and anxiety are pretty widespread around here as soon as the leaves drop. In fact, I have a few friends who decided to study abroad because they didn’t feel they could survive another Ohio winter.

For the record, I don’t believe in SAD. I think there are too many medical “disorders” that try to diagnose perfectly natural (if not exactly healthy) behaviors. But I do believe that winter sets college students up for isolation and depression– especially on this campus. Somehow it’s easier to stay holed up in tall stone gothic architecture.

But it turns out that there are some beautiful things in winter: little pick-me-ups, like pink-peach sunrises from my bedroom window which make it a little bit easier to get up for my early class. Stuff like this keeps me from going all Jack Nicholson in The Shining on my classmates.