Pup is laying in a pile of stuffed animals. I am safely ensconced in a pile of flannel sheets trying to upload artwork to make into calendars.

Trying is the operative word. I am failing at present. It is also -5 degrees, and Pup just informed me he is going on strike until life warms up to at least above 0. It’s a bitter day out there. A worn down day in here.

I feel like I’m running on fumes and am staring into a few weeks where I don’t see adequate time to refuel myself the way I really need.

Women need solitude in order to find again the true essence of themselves, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea.

She’s right. Solitude is what I crave right now. But not just any solitude. Not the solitude after work that was just sucked dry by folding laundry, straightening the kitchen, fixing the broken garage door, making calendars.

I crave a quality of solitude that instantly cuts through the layers of day to day, superficiality, have to’s, necessities, and goes straight to the deep, thirsty, necessary spot in my soul that has had little space to emerge and survey the world lately. She has been buried under a slew of busyness, work, obligations.

And I hear her knocking. Perhaps a little frantically, as she asks when will she have time to inhabit the space she needs. I am not my best self when she’s not tended.

I don’t have the answer to that this moment, except to tell her I’m trying to get everything balanced. In the meantime the harsh cold just makes everything harsher and as the long days weigh on me, I am thoughtful that this is exactly what my blog is supposed to be about.

Moments like this. Where life feels a bit barren, and a girl is in need of light. Finding sunshine in winter. I am in need of a little right now.

Physical sunshine that warms the body and reminds one what it is to feel warmed from the outside in.

Spiritual sunshine that nourishes the spirit and reminds one what it is to feel warmed from the inside out.

I am not sure how to find that tonight in a way that fully meets what I know I need, but I am reminded that starting this blog was a challenge to self to find sunshine in unlikely spaces.

To find sunshine when the long days of winter chafe against my cheeks, my lips, my spirits. To find sunshine when the long days of work and obligations begins to chafe against my rapidly depleting soul who craves solitude and depth of nurture to feed her creative and spiritual self. To find sunshine when life feels a bit harsh.

Softness. Warmth. Light. An ease of burden. A freedom in the chest as one takes in Light. Connectivity. Love. Intuition. Communion. Compassion. Union. Relaxation.

Sunshine.

This is what sunshine means to me.

For tonight I think it will simply do to listen to myself with softness and warmth and validate my own needs for nurture on a deeper level than I’ve been providing. I may not quite have the time for that at present, but I can be conscious of my need and look for ways to create it in the future.

In the meantime I will take the creature comforts this evening offers- a glass of red wine, quiet candlelight, enough time to pause and think and write this post, the softest fleece sheets around.

The comfort of a sweet new Pup curled up at my side. We get to know one another a little bit more each day, him and I, allowing the tiny seeds of new love to slowly take root and deepen.

The remembrance of a sweet old Dog who I choose to believe is standing over me right now, shining up there in the night’s sky alongside crisp stars, reminding me he is there to light the way.

A heart that will not be quenched, reminding me how dry it feels when long days lingers and winter is hard.

And the ability to find sunshine in winter.

Even on the coldest of days.