I don’t hibernate. I keep active through the winter. I’m no hypochondriac and I wouldn’t insult genuine sufferers by suggesting I experienced SAD. But I can’t deny that I live for the summer. Life for me revolves around cycling and festivals and there’s no getting away from the fact that both work better with warm sunshine and long hours of daylight. I book my festivals as early as I can; it makes tangible the prospect of a distant season long before it arrives. It helps me cope with the winter sogginess of this England’s cheerless marshes, as someone may have said.
Boy, how I understand why the pagans celebrated certain key dates of the year – the turning points, the banishing of the darkness, the renewal of fertility. But Midwinter’s Day just isn’t, is it? The middle of winter, I mean. There’s far too much still to come. But today it was light as I cycled home at five o’clock, earlier in the week there were blue tits singing like it was spring. By the second weekend in February, you can believe that the end is in sight; we have passed Top Dead Centre of winter. Now we dare celebrate. We’ve cracked it.
From this weekend, the wait for the next Cropredy is less than the time elapsed since the last. I call this the Cropredy Solstice and I mark it in the calendar thus. So I shall now unscrew the cap from my hipflask and let the aroma of Scottish waters mix with those of anticipated English meadows in my mind and memory. Best of health and fortitude to all those looking forward to shrugging off winter’s clammy grip. Not long to go now.
Freddy Steady says
The older I get, the more I loathe the dark and dreary winter months. I’ve been measuring the days by the time I want my boys back before it’s too dark so yes, at five o clock it’s still light enough.
Roll on on Spring , Summer, light and warmth.
deramdaze says
Admire the idea…..love cricket…..but wet, windy, dark and desperate Saturday afternoons at down-at-heel football/rugby clubs with absolutely no amenities do not happen outside November-February.
dai says
Going to be -28 here (-40 wind chill) on Saturday (Ottawa)
pencilsqueezer says
I love the winter. It lasts all year round here in Cymru. Drab, unremittingly grey and brimming with drizzle it makes my heart thrum with melancholic misery.
I don’t of course wear a skirt (kilt). Which would of course amongst real men cause extreme ‘pruning’.
Peanuts Molloy says
“Drab, unremittingly grey and brimming with drizzle . . . ”
I know you’re being deliberately pencilsqueezerish here but I have to speak up and suggest you look again. I was born and raised less than 20 miles from where you live and it’s a glorious part of the country. The sun shines the same as anywhere else and within two hours travel you have Chester, Porthmadoc (great record shop), Aberdyfi, Llangollen, Snowdonia, Betsw-y- Coed, Shrewsbury and more.
Enjoy it. There’s no reason not to.
pencilsqueezer says
As you so rightly identified Peanuts I am riffing on the “It’s always raining in Wales” trope. Where I live is exceedingly rundown and drab but as you point out it is well positioned for access to some glorious places. It’s a little difficult to get to many of them without a car but I do visit my much loved place of birth Chester pretty frequently.
You are right about Cob Records in Porthmadoc. A splendid emporium.
Baron Harkonnen says
I hate to be pedantic Mr Squeezer old bean but it`s Cob Records, Porthmadog with a G, indeed it was raining when I was last there,
thecheshirecat says
Isn’t the G the Welsh spelling and the C the English? (And when it comes to placenames, I love to be pedantic.)
pencilsqueezer says
This is true. Bloody stupid non-Welsh phone.
Baron Harkonnen says
Like it! Have an ↑.
ernietothecentreoftheearth says
Gosh, judging by your description the weather must have improved 100% since I was a lad?
Gary says
I’m often asked if I like living in Italy and my reply depends very much on the time year. As far as I’m concerned I live in two very different countries: winter and summer. In the winter, where I live is boring, everyone’s miserable and uptight, the telly, politics, bureaucracy and stuff are all depressingly shite. But in the summer I get to live beach life – meeting friends, eating, sleeping, reading, swimming – it’s a wonderful way to pass the days. Everyone’s happy and super chilled.
Mind you, winter slows down the passing of time a little. If it was all summer my life would whizz by even faster.
Peanuts Molloy says
” …. meeting friends, eating, sleeping, reading ….”
Cheer up, Chum; you can do all of them things in the wintertime as well.
Hope that helps.
PS. of course you can do swimming as well but I do appreciate you may not want to.
Gary says
Ah, but not at the beach. I hate socialising anywhere else, me. Wanna know my favourite thing about winter? Course you don’t. It’s when clementines are in season. Anyone who doesn’t know the diff twixt clementines, tangerines, satsumas and mandarins is wasting their life on this planet. Clementines are the best thing ever, while mandarins are barely worth acknowledging.
mikethep says
I feel much the same as you, Mr Cat…except that here in Brisbane it’s the end of summer I’m looking forward to. Three months of 30 deg+ heat, 80% humidity and thunderstorms are quite enough, thank you. Three months of so-called autumn – nothing happens like leaves falling, it just gets cooler. The Brisbane summer is like the most perfect English summer you can imagine – day after day of cloudless skies, not much rain and temperatures around 22-3 deg.
Peanuts Molloy says
” …. it’s the end of summer I’m looking forward to …..”
(I’m on a roll here and gonna continue) . . . . don’t look forward to the end of something. (Unless it’s a bad thing. Which being a bit too hot isn’t, really.) You’re wishing your life away.
mikethep says
Well, it’s only 2 weeks….might I diffidently suggest that there’s a bit of a difference between wishing your life away and looking forward to something coming to an end? As it happens I’m looking forward to the end of 8 weeks of radiotherapy in the hottest months of the summer. But if you prefer, I’m really really looking forward to autumn.
Peanuts Molloy says
Mike. I didn’t respond to “I’m looking forward to the end of 8 weeks of radiotherapy in the hottest months of the summer” which is a whole different ball game and which I wish you nothing but love and best wishes.
My response was to ” …. it’s the end of summer I’m looking forward to …..” which is something I’m all too aware that I did when I was younger when the years ahead seemed endless.
I really hope all goes well for you in the next stage of whatever happens next.
mikethep says
That was unfair of me, I’m sorry. But thank you for your good wishes anyway!
Johnny Concheroo says
Don’t you mean the Brisbane winter is like a perfect English summer Mike?
I loathe the Aussie summers and have gone to Tasmania this week to escape a record five days in a row of 40+ degrees in Perth which is just mental.
Here in Tassie it’s been mid 20s all week at the height of summer. Even that feels hot at times, but those cool nights and mornings are perfect.
mikethep says
Yes I did! Brain addled. Enjoy Tassie.
Johnny Concheroo says
Thanks Mike, Tassie is always great. Possibly the most English place in Australia. Nice people who can laugh at themselves, too. The guy demonstrating the life jackets on a boat trip we went on said “we have some of these with two head holes in case any Tasmanians are on board”
Kaisfatdad says
Escape to Tasmania! You make it sound very attractive.
I didn’t know that nickname. Talk about a cue for a song.
“I’m in love with a lassie from Tassie.”
Johnny Concheroo says
Unlike the Tommy Steele hit “Talahassie Lassie” (a cover of a Freddie Cannon US hit I think
mikethep says
Freddy Cannon indeed…he nails just about all the Tassie rhymes you can think of. Any excuse.
Johnny Concheroo says
Thanks Mike, that was even a live favourite of Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac circa 1969
DougieJ says
Great post @thecheshirecat. I too am feeling that Spring is just around the corner. This, however, is more to do with my advancing years (going on 49!) than anything else. It’s perhaps exacerbated by the fact that I’ve just requested my entire year’s holiday from work (school hols, natch), but I do have a distinct sense of time flying with each passing year.
Yes, I know, next I’ll be remarking upon youthful police officers but still – queer old thing, time.
Peanuts Molloy says
“…. queer old thing, time ….”
Yes. We all have the same amount (24 hours per day, last time I looked) but how we use it is up to us.
As we get older, with hindsight, I’m guessing we could all have used some of it better.
bungliemutt says
I reckon there is something good to be said about all the seasons. At this time of year most of us can’t wait for the unremitting misery of the winter months to lose its grip, and there is nothing to beat the slowly lengthening days and first stirrings of growth in late February and early March. The burst of freshness and greenness of late April and May is unbeatable, followed by the perfection of June. By the time summer starts to wane I love that gentle descent back into autumn, with its beautiful sunsets and lengthening shadows. It’s always a reflective time of year, a slowing down that slips quietly into the drab and foggy days of November when it’s good to be at home with a good book, a glass of wine, or curled up in front of a good film. And then it’s Christmas, which I also love for its traditions and connotations of an ancient past linked to notions of rebirth and renewal. Seasons, eh? You just can’t beat ’em.
Getthenet says
My thoughts entirely Bungliemutt. Especially the bit about April and May.
Kaisfatdad says
Wonderful OP Cheshire. Love the idea of a Cropredy Solstice. For me it’s a Roskilde Solstice.
With Midwinter (Lucia), Valborg (the greeting of Spring) and of course Midsummer Eve (party night number one) all very important days of the year here, the Scandos are far more in touch with their pagan roots.
retropath2 says
Of course, the problem is that of the gap between a decent Cropredy, solstice or not. This year it’s another, by and large, stinker. Just hoping they’re counting their pennies for next years 50th.
Bamber says
I posted this on a recent Spring has Sprung thread. I’ve noticed the birdlife here in County Dublin springing to life in recent weeks, flowers blooming and occasional heat from the sun so I’m sticking with my seasonal calendar. I believe Valentines Day used to be regarded as the start of Spring and the romantic link was that it was traditionally the day that doves start their mating. I will look out for them over the weekend…
“Bamber says
04/02/2016 at 21:02
Today is actually, more precisely, mathematically the first day of Spring. In a leap year such as this each season should last 91.5 days. So working from either midwinter last year or midsummer of this year, Spring starts today. Someday the rest of the world will agree to join me in this logical method for calculating this important point in the calendar.”
Getthenet says
To keep my spirits up spring begins in February. ….cold weather or not. Birds and plants seem to agree too. In a very short time the world will be a warmer and more colourful place.