a list of things to look forward to in the colder season
…because I need to trick my brain sometimes
I’m going to be honest: I don't love the colder season. I love summer, I love being warm, I love being outside until it's stupidly late and wearing clothes that don't require strategic planning, I love summery fruits and the sun and getting enough Vitamin D without actively working for it.
Unfortunately, none of this is currently up for discussion. Winter is coming, and there is nothing I can do about it, so I have decided to manipulate myself.
If I make a list of all the things I genuinely love about this time of year, maybe my brain will eventually forget that it is cold and dark at 4pm and start having fun. This is my attempt, these are the things I am choosing to look forward to:
boiling myself alive in a burning hot bath water
I know there is probably a medically responsible temperature for a bath, but I don't care. I want to get in and feel like I am being slowly cooked, I want to emerge looking like a boiled lobster. This is wellness to me.
reading in a cozy coffee shop while it's raining outside
Preferably somewhere with fogged-up windows, a pumpkin-spiced pastry and absolutely no reason whatsoever to leave, I want to look out the window and feel like I am starring in a movie about a woman who has her life together.
going to the cinema
Going to the cinema hits different when it's cold outside, I want to leave the house when it's already dark and sit in a room with twenty strangers and not thinking about reality for two hours.
pumpkins
Obviously. See previous entry, I have nothing further to add at this time.
fall songs
There are specific songs and even bands that hit different in fall. Talking The Smiths, The Cure, Bob Dylan, Girl in Red, the list goes on.
clubbing
Of course it's better in summer, I stand by this. But there is something extremely fun about getting dressed up when it is absolutely fucking freezing outside, running from the door to the club like your life depends on it and then spending hours pretending winter doesn't exist because you physically cannot see it.
pretty fall leaves
I know everyone says this, but I don't care, give me one street where all the trees have turned orange and yellow and I will suddenly become unbearably sentimental about being alive.
sauna
There is something deeply satisfying about voluntarily sitting in a room that feels like the inside of hell and then walking back outside into the cold.
cinnamon buns
I want to eat an unreasonable amount of cinnamon buns this winter.
being cold for exactly five minutes before getting inside
I don't want to be cold, I just want the experience of having been cold and then getting warm again.
soup
Not even necessarily a specific soup. Just soup. I want to come home when it's freezing outside, make something unnecessarily large in a pot and eat it out of a bowl while wrapped in a blanket. Soup is one of the few things that makes me actively grateful that it's cold outside.
walking home in the dark
There are days (rare, but it does happen) when walking home in the dark when it's cold is something that I weirdly love. Headphones on, hands in my pockets, everyone disappearing into their apartments, it makes the city feel completely different.
crisp air
That first proper cold morning when you step outside and the air is so crisp feels great. Preferably experienced from the open window of my apartment, so I can close the window minutes later and retreat back to the warmth of my bedroom.
christmas
I am not ready to discuss this yet. But I know it's coming, and eventually, I will become completely insufferable about it.
new Year's Eve
Fuck yeah, I´m a sucker for New Year´s Eve, and I love to be overly dramatic about it.
the weird little period between Christmas and New Year's
My favorite non-existent week of the year. Nobody knows what day it is, nobody knows what they're supposed to be doing and somehow you are allowed to eat leftovers at 3pm, watch a film at 11am and stay in your pyjamas for a week. Time doesn't exist, work doesn't exist, the calendar has temporarily lost its authority.