Wintering
Day 55 of my 100 days project
I went jogging the other day.
It was not a success.
I’ve been running since I was fifteen or sixteen years old, and considering my age, that accounts for a lot of years. Interestingly enough, over the course of those years, I haven’t gotten appreciably better at running.
Sure, I hit a peak in my late thirties, when a dear friend and I tackled the Disney Princess Half Marathon, but even at that supposed high, I’ve never been fast. And from that not terribly exalted height, my productivity, speed, and distance have all been on a gentle decline.
That does not account for what happened the other day. I went out there, ran for less than ten minutes, and just noped the whole endeavor. I couldn’t understand it.
Then I remembered, this happens to me at this time of year. It’s not always running. Sometimes it's writing, sometimes it's socializing, sometimes just a feeling. It’s a slowing down, a lethargy that is sometimes combined with a kind of mental restlessness, or just an inability to focus so intently on the things that seemed like second nature.
I didn’t have a name for this feeling of needing both rest and change at the same time until I read Katherine May’s book Wintering, which captures it so perfectly. May describes wintering as a time for recuperation and reflection, to slow down, replenish, and put one’s house in order.
It’s hard for me to accept that this slowing of my energy and enthusiasm isn’t some kind of personal failure, but a natural cycle that I face year after year. I feel it coming on once the summer has fled and the excitement of back to school and Halloween is over. When there are no more fall days that still feel like the bottom edge of summer, and the first frost stuns the plants and webs the car windshield, and the dark closes in with the change of the clocks. I know I’m not the only one who feels it in my bones and wonders if something in me has broken.
May’s concept of wintering extends beyond the scope of the season itself and also deals with the metaphorical winters we all face in life. The winters of illness, or loss, or grief arrive for all of us at some point or another. Yet the concept is the same. In a barren and hard world, it is ok to go slow, to close in a bit, to protect, and to have grace for yourself and for others. And perhaps, by honoring the winters of our days, instead of relentlessly fighting them, we get the chance to see the beauty of the season, even in its harshness.
So tomorrow I’m going to walk instead; no headphones, no watch, no tracking at all, and I’ll welcome the beginning of my winter.
Till next time,
Jessica