Hey there, warm seasons greetings to your inbox. It's me Tom Critchlow - friendly internet consultant, blogger and lover of the color green.
Winter is not the season with the most memories (that would be summer) but it is the season with the deepest memories. As my friend Toby Shorin says:
"Winter is no barren season; dreams are its fruit."
I don't think of England as home very often anymore - I've been living in Brooklyn for 12 years now. But winter is the season that makes me long for the Yorkshire dales. Deep memories of cold churches and roaring fireplaces. Of Christmas carols and snowball fights. Of green rolling hills dotted with sheep, floating like clouds on the frosted earth.
In December 2000, Pete Lawrence - founder of the Big Chill music festival in the UK - made a music mix called Deep and Crisp and Even.
24 years later and I still listen to this album every winter. It reminds me of home.
Where is home for you? In the deep mid-winter where do your bones return to?
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Speaking of home. I just gave my website a little refresh with a new homepage and new consulting page.
This past year has been perhaps the hardest professionally so far. Full of indecisiveness, paralysis and stuck-ness. Like a sheep adrift from the flock.
Read the recap -> 9 Years on the Road
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After much part-time work the book is finally the most important thing on my todo list. I'm committing to finishing it by the first day of Spring. As part of that I'm going to write a little behind-the-scenes pop-up newsletter to document the writing of the book. I'll send a link to that next week when it's up.
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Because of the internet of course you can follow along with a farmer in the Yorkshire dales feeding his sheep in the deep midwinter ("the sheep are pleased to see me" the farmer mutters, as the sheep amble away from him):
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Much love to you all - may you find grace and temerity in 2024. Hit reply, I'd love to know what you're up to!