the cottage playlist - cold rain and snow
“Wisdom comes with Winters” - Oscar Wilde
Summer is my favorite season. Probably because I was born in June. The animal in me loves to be outside - to live ‘al fresco’ - and Summer creates no resistance, to eat and play in parks, beaches and meadows, swim in water, stay up late, dream, ride bikes to get ice cream; to be in nature is to touch the magic of the world. These are the fat days, for better or worse, with overabundant gardens, sunshine, warm breezes, fireflies, and equally abundant opportunities, parties, concerts, and travel. Whatever stress the extra activity brings, I enter a quiet challenge to see just how much Summer I can cram into a Summer. Like a Bruce Brown documentary, I seek an endless one, where the waves are long, rolling and repeating, and where the fifth ripe watermelon is as subsisting as the first.
Winter, by comparison, gets by on novelty: the delight I experience on the first cold day when we open the flu and put on a log. The magic of the first fluffy snowfall, when we’ll throw ourselves into building snowmen, or going sledding for hours, with wet freezing hands and red snotty noses. My children pray for a white Christmas. And then the novelty wears off, the snow becomes a chore. We joke that February is the “longest month of the year.” No one is asking for an endless winter, and we aren’t soaking in anything; we merely endure.
But in the last few years, I’ve become what I call winter-curious. I find myself looking forward to the chance to hibernate, to guzzle cups of hot tea (I seriously go through an entire case of this stuff every month). You’ll even find me taking daily walks, weather come what may. I can’t tell you what caused the shift, but I wonder since having kids, and having my days filled with all sorts of new jobs-to-be-done, if Summer’s “open door policy” to my schedule may be finally taking its toll. I’ve also learned that Winter affords me my most sober and most creative months of the year: with more time shuttered indoors, I’m forced to find constructive alternatives to while away the hours, like playing music, reading, writing, and of course, playing with my kids. And these good feelings that come from being trapped indoors and enjoying myself, turn out to be compounding and reinforcing: the temperature starts to drop, and I actually look forward to some future bitter cold.
Which brings me to the cottage we designed in Ohio. This week, it’s been featured in Country Living magazine as part of their February issue. While it’s coming out in Winter, the photos were taken in Summer (you’ll notice the bounty of queen annes lace, which we grabbed from the neighboring field). And the cottage could be pitched as a summer house, given its bucolic setting, the back yard begging for a garden party. But after getting in touch with my Winter side, I’ve come to believe in her heart she’s a Winter home. There’s the soaking tub and fireplace, which bring relaxing warmth and ritual. And the single-pane windows that frost over in cold temps, creating these little storybook vignettes out of each square. The size plays a part too: it’s a very small footprint (800 sq ft!) that is overstuffed with furniture, creating a dim, nest-like setting. It’s purpose: to serve up cozy and contemplative. To hug you in it’s tiny frame. To reduce the noise, as a snowfall does, and bring about connection through board games, cocktails, and fireside conversation. A place where it feels genuinely good to be trapped inside. The only thing still left to do is make a playlist - one that gins up that embered, cozy feeling of happiness when the outside is bleak, cold, and dark.
What’s on the record player? Here’s my playlist designed especially for the cozy cottage in the cold rain and snow, to give you that feeling wherever you are.
