Snowflakes & Daffodils

Winter and I have never gotten along…creatively, anyway. Snowball fights? Of course. Skating? Absolutely. Hot chocolate? A no-brainer. Ideas? Not so much. They hibernate right along with Bear from Karma Wilson’s Bear Snores On. No party to wake and shake things up is going to jolt a creative thought out of its slumber before it’s ready. Trust me. I’ve tried many ways to fix this flat. Here’s a brief list:

1.    Chocolate. While this is a tasty option, it only leads to more hours in the gym.

2.    Travel. As a rule, I don’t between December and March. Now, if there was sun and sand involved….

3.    Conferences. Great for networking and learning something, but the “application” stalls like the DeLorean out of plutonium in Back to the Future.

4.    Exercise. See #1.

5.    Writing. Brilliant ideas spark-out and die as quickly as a summer firefly’s blink.

This “issue” almost begs to be named a syndrome. It’s worse than writer’s block. That at least can be written out of. No, this causes creativity to come to a full-out, grinding halt. Nothing. Nada. Zip. Zero. Dead. Writer’s hibernation? Very possible. There is something about the change in seasons, from fall to winter.  The cooler temperatures, change in colors, and geese flying south seem to leave the following voice mail message: “Thank you for calling Liz’s muse. I’m sorry. All ideas are on hiatus right now. Please leave your thought at the beep and the creative brain cells will get back to you at the first sign of warmer weather.  [Pause].  Beeeeeep.”

    An argument could be made that this so-called hibernation is a time when things swirl around in the brain like the season’s snowflakes, slowly working themselves into a shape…which would explain spring’s effect. That first sunny, warm (by ‘warm’ I mean in the seventies) weekend, when the daffodils, tulips, and crocus decide enough is enough and shrug off the heavy gray coats they’ve been wearing for months…finally inspires this writer’s muse. Those wintry snowflakes morph into a spring blizzard of ideas, passages, and revisions that are next to impossible to keep up with. 

   Hey look! I’ve written something. Could spring be close? Hmmm…may-be. Better load up on legal pads and pens. 

Confused Daffodils