January has little appeal for me; the weather makes getting out harder, and the swimming pool is too busy.* For a long time, I went with the current culture of jumping right back into it, new year, new resolutions, but that doesn’t work out well for me. I like to ease into the the year gently, like a little hibernating mouse rousing itself slowly, only when the temperature is correct.
It goes against the grain. Algorithms punish you if you are not posting regularly, and people are horrified. I was once harassed by a member of a Buddhist group for saying I would not be at the January retreat, or any classes; presumably he thought that group mediation should be part of the restorative process, but he was running it, and he was quite a stressful person. We must hustle, we must be seen to be productive, and constant, in all things.
I’m not constant, I’m mercurial and moody and tired at this time of year. I take my cues from the seasons, sometimes bursting and growing, sometimes resting and waiting. It’s a different way of living from the one we’re told is correct.You also see this with people who are ‘night owls’- a sort of morality is put into when you do your work, as if it is more wholesome if you rise early rather than just judging the quality of output. It annoys me.
Having said that, I’ve not been completely inert this holidays, I’ve made three particularly good things (none of them are prints). First off, a fine pair of very red dungarees, as ordered by my son. He’s wearing the same pattern size as me for growing room, which made them an easy make, but is subtly horrifying because he’s not really my little boy any more (although it does mean I can steal these an pretend to be a German PhD student when he’s not looking).
I also bought him they Lewis chess set moulds for Christmas- I remember Christmas being a bit disappointing when you get to an age where you stop getting toys, so always try to include something to make and do. I also remember loving a good plaster cast kit, but the process is a lot easier when you are not the supervising adult. We did manage to master the process without any bubbles and make a handsome chess set though.
Finally I decided to make myself a sort of book of days to make nature notes etc in. I know diaries are readily available but I’m very fussy about paper, and also I like to make my life (and my brothers, who invariably gets dragged into my projects because of his woodworking skills) difficult. I was aiming for a sort of Victorian ledger, having scavenged a small piece of teal leather. I’ve made sketchbooks before by badly binding together a text block, but never bothered to cover it properly so it was quite a learning curve.
There are many steps in creating a book from scratch, and I managed to make at least one mistake in all of them; there are so many mistakes in this book the perfectionist in me wants to start all over again and do it properly. I could do a much better job with all this hindsight, but I think it is good to embrace flaws and learn to enjoy wonky books, and besides, it’s terribly hard to write inside very perfect books.
Anyway, I hope you had a pleasant start to the year, and if you didn’t, it’s just an arbitrary date and you can start again anytime with you resolutions and what not.
*not that I would want to discourage you from starting exercising, in fact, I think you should; just not in January. If I’m finding it too busy and off putting at the leisure centre, then you would too, only you won’t realise all those people will give up in couple of weeks. Choose one of the other months.