First Snow in the City and Hygge

I never know when inspiration will hit, or what form it will take. 

I look out this window every day. My desk faces it. I practice yoga in front of it. I notice the changes, if any, as the days go by. The landscape doesn't offer as many seasonal clues here as our backyard does in the country, so it can be easy to lose track of the Earth's position in relation to the Sun. The only clue lies in the ever decreasing amount of daylight. 

The scene outside our other window seems just as desolate and cold upon first glance. I've come to appreciate this new view, though. There's a building going up next door and I imagine the future time-lapse footage that will document its rising. I imagine this space before any buildings. How did the snow alter that ancient landscape? These things I ponder as I feel myself becoming inspired...

​And then I peer out just a bit farther through the first window and notice this:

Five light posts on the top deck of a parking garage across the way. What's so inspiring about that, you might ask? 

I don't know, exactly. All I do know that the first words that came to me were these:

First snow in the city,
​I'm going to need that hygge.

Now, I am well aware that city and hygge do not rhyme when hygge is pronounced correctly (hoo-guh). However, my funny little mind spontaneously (perhaps intentionally) mispronounced it semi-phonetically (higgee). To me, this makes the ditty amusing on a different level. It's a play on the way a non-Danish person would probably pronounce it upon first glance. It also reminds me of the intentional mispronunciations often seen in limericks and other such comedic poetry forms.

My next thoughts were to describe what the objects might be, if not light posts:

Y
Why?
Victory!
Who knows?
Tethered gulls
​

This all may seem like nonsense to everyone else, but to me, moments like these are exciting. I'm just barely getting my writing chops back, with a healthy fear that I've lost my creativity altogether. So when I have a silly little spark like this, it gives me hope.

And in celebration of my first snow in the city, please pick up a copy of First Snow: Poems and Folk-art of Winter.

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