It’s been a rough couple of weeks, don’t you think?. Everywhere, it seemed, bad news got grimmer and good news sparser. This guy, this crazy-wonderful / wonderful-crazy guy, left us bereft and heartbroken. Hope, in all manner of places and circumstances, seemed to pop and extinguish like lightbulbs. Wars got messier, revenge got uglier. It was nasty out there. I just wanted to bolt the doors, climb into bed and pull up the covers. For approximately three months.

In our world, a pleasant, suburban microcosm, the whole family got ill one after another. When the horrible-gremlin-viral-thingy had been through each of us it tagged its minacious cousin and the cycle started all over again. And again. I, like everyone else, blame the season. I’ll admit I’m simply no good at it. If I were to write a book about my relationship with it it would be titled “Winter and Meh.” In winter my body just wants to build a thick layer of blubber (well, hellllloo chocolate) and hibernate. I’m sooky, I’m cranky, I’m needy. Crabby, overwhelmed, restless and listless.

My poor attitude has sparked a series of debates. In my own head. With myself. (That’s how people like us roll, no?) On the one hand, it’s okay to feel flat and irritable and sometimes eat all the things in the pantry including the kids raisins and spoonfuls of peanut butter. And on the other hand…really? At my age? Do I need to be doing this? Sure – my head argued with…ah…itself – it’s winter, you’ve all been ill, you’ve got post-holiday blues, you’re going into a different phase with your manuscript, plus you’ve probably got PMS, plus you’re pre-disposed to being a maudlin pain in the %#$@, but….do you WANT to be like this? Huh? Is this what we’re going with here? My brain had a good point. It can be clever like that.

Clearly (pun intended) it was time for a change of lens.

And… I genuinely needed a change of lens. My camera lens broke when we were in Europe. Nifty segue?

On Friday I woke up and The Sun Was Out. Cue mouth-gape. So I decided to take my newly fixed camera for a field trip. We caught the ferry and went into town. It felt a little odd. We hadn’t been out together for a while and we rarely go out alone, we’re usually with the kids. We had a date. Together we looked at things we had looked at before and tried to notice them differently. I’ve recently been inspired by the street photography of the mysterious and fascinating Vivian Maier. My camera and I spotted brand new things. We read signs. We glanced up. We watched people go about their day. We even went to the art gallery and had a cup of tea together. It was almost romantic.

Best of all (other than those gnomes) was the light. The light ’round here is changing. It’s not officially spring but it’s thinking about it. Daffodils are sending up shoots. Today the sky was clear and the air crisp all day long. Not a single grey and brooding cloud on the horizon. With even the weather being optimistic I decided to try it out for size. Give cheerfulness a go.

It was a beautiful day. The light, the wandering, the camera lovin’. But, to be honest, I’m just not quite there yet. Whatever there is. It’d suit me much better to conclude – and then I was fine! Rainbows and lollipops! – but the truth is there is a bit more of this season, my winter, to work through. I’m not worried. Seasons come and go, that I have learned. Lift your heads, darling daffodils.

HUGS

Hannah x

P.S. How are YOU?