Autumnal Cozy

 What makes Autumn Cozy?

Autumn Allure - Mixed media collage

   We've 'Fallen Back' to Standard Time again this past weekend maybe for the last time. Although the Senate has passed a bill to stop end the practice of the turning the clocks forward in the spring and backwards in the fall, it hasn't become law. 

Like many people, I tend to experience a disruption to my circadian rhythms. When my kids were little it threw the whole household off for a week. Crankiness abounded not only at home but also at work where sleep deprived adolescents struggle with the addition of the time change. 

Worse still is the knowledge that winter is on its way, and the early sunset marks the approach of the solstice in December. Funny how we say that there will be shorter days when the day itself is still 24 hours, it's just the amount of daylight hours that are shortened. 

During my teaching tenure, trying to explain the phenomenon of how the seasons occur to students was rather tricky. Our spherical planet sits on an axis, with a tilt of approximately 23 degrees, around which it revolves giving us night and day. As the Earth moves around the Sun, the tilt always stays in the same direction, and as a result the hemispheres experience either summer or winter depending on whether or not you are tilted towards or away from the sun. 

The ancients knew and understood the cycle around the sun. The henges of stone in places around the world mark the celestial movements. Even I have come to recognize the landmarks of the sun's path on my piece of land. Now that autumn is here, the sun isn't as high in the sky as it was in summer. Even though the sun hasn't set, I need to turn on the lights in the eastern facing rooms of the house in order to do tasks like reading, drawing/painting, or knitting in the late afternoon. 

Morning sun in Autumn

Living in a wooded area also leads to early darkness as the sun's beams are filtered by the branches. In more mountainous regions, you lose the light even sooner when the sun sinks behind the ridges. It takes longer in the morning for the light to rise as well. 

Laura Weir in her book Cozy: The British Art of Comfort, she wrote about light as an element of coziness. Think of the sense of comfort when you come into a lighted room from a dark night, the glow of candles, or the mesmerizing flicker of flames whether it be in a fireplace or that of a campfire. 

Cozy lamplight 

I will confess that when I drive at night, I love the glow from people's windows. That little glimpse into someone else's world. A kitchen here, a big screen TV there, a reading lamp or a candle lit to guide someone home. 

We all need to create a time and space for ourselves to snuggle down and restore our souls from the struggles of the world outside. A safe space regardless of its size or the amount of funds we have to spend on creating it. It is about what we do when we share that space with others. Family and friends are invited into our cozy as well. We bring cozy with us when we can. Travel mugs for hot drinks in the car. Our trinkets at work on our desk. The small thing we might tuck into a pocket, purse, or suitcase when we travel. Cozy isn't just a way of decorating, it is a state of mind and being. Let's try to be more cozy in our lives. For our personal well being, for our family and friends, for strangers, and even for our world.