I’m a creature of habit. I like to set up structures for myself and work within them. I’ve never had much trouble shifting my routines when things begin to feel stale, but having at least some kind of repetition from day to day helps me to feel productive and centered. In the mornings I walk. [...]
As flowers go, crocuses are excellent role models. Every spring they stretch their resilient little faces skyward and unfurl their tight little petals to whatever it is that will greet them. It doesn’t matter how much dirt and debris lies on top of them, how much snow or sleet or rain falls on them, they [...]
It’s a miraculous thing, what a few extra hours of daylight can do. Last week we finally turned the corner in our saga of wintertime suffering and pushed our clocks ahead. Waking up in the semi-darkness isn’t exactly my cup of tea, but I’d gladly take the darker morning that comes with the time change [...]
I like things with lots of layers: neatly made beds topped with piles of sheets and blankets, chocolate mousse cakes, birthday presents wrapped in tissue paper first and wrapping paper second. It’s partially the discovery of peeling each layer back and seeing what’s underneath, and partially the recognizing that it’s parts that make up a [...]
We’ve been on a lentil soup kick lately. Red lentils, french lentils, any old lentil we can find for cheap in the bulk section of our grocery store, we’ve been buying it. There’s not a recipe that we’ve been using so much as a series of habits: sauté some amount of savory onion or shallot [...]
These are my plants. Or most of them anyway. I crammed them onto a shelf one morning a few weeks ago in an effort to give them all a little extra dose of sunlight. My geranium, which has been steadily hanging on since April, was beginning to look a little droopy and I was worried [...]
It’s not a city thing, exactly. The wintertime in this hemisphere means spending large amounts of time indoors for lots of people. But in a January that’s filled with both wintry days and looming deadlines, time spent indoors can reach epic proportions. Last week I tallied up the hours that I spent within the four [...]
January comes and suddenly I have the urge to soak myself in a hot tub. The impulse usually only lasts for a few weeks and the total number of baths that I take in a given year never totals more than a few. But it’s that hopeful time of year again and baths have been [...]
