26 thoughts on “Reader Friday: Writing While Cold

  1. Nope. I write inside regardless. Cold weather DOES make me hibernate from exercise, which is a very bad thing….

  2. Most definitely. In the corner of our basement there’s a fireplace, a recliner couch, and an overhead light. I’ll be there, in the early morning darkness, with only the one light and the warmth of the fire keeping the shadows away, and I’ll type until breakfast.

    In the summer, I’m upstairs with windows and sunlight.

    • YOU are the seasonal writer I was thinking of, Amanda! One who migrates with the changing light, shades, and temps of the seasons. Kudos to you for perservering during the sol’s wintry nadir. And thank you for sharing that!

    • The Californians (and Floridians, except they’re not included due to major bugs and alligators) must declare, in unison, “Don’t hate our weather because it’s beautiful!”

  3. I stay in the same place, an extra upstairs bedroom I have converted to an office. I want my Muse to know where to look for me, should she decide to pay me a visit.

    • My Muse actually prefers miserable weather, Dana. Kind of like the way depressed people feel cheered up by a rainstorm. My Muse needs Prozac, but then I’m afraid she’d never visi!

  4. Same as Diane C, subbing WA for FL and 48 degrees for our high today. Sigh.

    Hmmm. Maybe the question for Basil should be how does he manage when and if the temperature goes above, say, 80;-).

  5. You guys are making me realize that the advent of the laptop might have been the beginning of my (procrastination) downfall. I used to go to my home office every day, tethered to that huge HP computer. Now, have laptop, will travel. Which can be distracting at times. I wish it were cold right now…I always seem to get more writing done when sun disappears.

  6. If I didn’t write when it was cold, I’d never write but a few weeks in June/July.

    In summer I do write outside in my hammock at every possible chance. Come rains of autumn and winter’s snow I write inside in my comfy wing-back recliner, and sometimes put a fire in the fireplace to knock a chill off as I sip a cup of tea (Throat Coathas a very soothing effect). Nice thing about about winter writing in the Sub-Arctic is the darkness, helps me focus on the screen in front of me instead of things moving outside my window.

    That darkness may not seem unusual to you in the Lower-48 who have dark nights all year, but when you measure day and night in periods of multiple months, and summer’s long days while great fun also mean very long tiring days of outside work, winter’s darkness is a welcome time for me to get caught up and rested.

  7. If anything, the cold weather only makes me write more because I am not tempted so much to sneak outdoors! ~ R.L. Black

  8. Up here in New Hampshire I set the fireplace a blazing, make a pot of coffee (or hot chocolate in the afternoon) and happily write while it snows outside as much as it’s like.
    I live in a complex that includes snow removal services so something I get up and watch the plow guys and shovelers. Then I shiver, get another cup of coffee and go back to writing. I tend to be very productive from Jan through March.

  9. Brrr! You guys are making me cold just reading your posts. In GA we don’t get much snow, but it has been raining for days. I am happy to stay indoors and write, but the weather can kill my sinuses and make seeing a chore. Today my screen looks like a winter whiteout. Maybe I need to switch to writing white on black? On the good side though, I met my goal of finishing my book before the end of the year. I can finally relax a while before the relatives come in for the holidays. That’s my Christmas present to myself! I was born in PA and sometime miss the snow. The grass is always greener…or is it the snow is always whiter?

  10. I spent eight winters in Florida, and it did something to my metabolism. Now that I’m back in Michigan, I’m cold all the time. This means I am now a heavy consumer of wool sweaters. Nothing skimpy, though, or synthetic. I’m talking about Shetland wool and rag-wool sweaters, heavy ones sold by LLBean. And long underwear. With the help of these two writing aids, I am still able to get the work out.

    • Barry, I left Michigan 48 years ago and moved to California [the parts where it doesn’t snow]. I’d really had it with the snow shoveling and the freezing fingers and toes. Upon escaping Hotel California ten years ago to Montana, I’m simply thrilled to be back in a place with real seasons and actual winter. It does take a while for the body to adjust to cold. Now I actually think of it as a good thing, and hike, ski and dog walk in it every day in winter. Of course, it’s a “dry” cold.

  11. I always write in the “hole”, my furnished basement. It’s my creative place. However, next week I travel to Florida. there I write in a comfy outdoor chair, sitting in the sun, with a cup of tea on the table then migrate inside to redo on computer. My two favorite places to write
    Frances

  12. In winter the gardening and farming are off the list. However, dog walks, cleaning, shopping, eating and sleeping are still there. Then there’s the snow shoveling. All of the above eat into the writing time. Then there’s the matter of how you measure writing time. Is it just sitting in the chair at the desk with computer on? I’d say yes to that. I could be thinking about writing. That counts. I could be reading and “writing” on TKZ. That counts. Research on Google counts, too.

    Exactly what constitutes valid writing time (VWT) should be explored on TKZ by an expert–someone with the initials BS, perhaps. Someone with a cold eye.

  13. No, but I do grab a blanket while I do so. It makes it more comfortable and the toasty warmth gets the Muse to flow. I think, actually, I write better this time of year than during the summer.

Comments are closed.