Hello Ramblers,
We're still in October, but the world outside looks very different from a couple of short weeks ago. There's a crispness to the air, the trees stand barer, and the evenings draw in a little earlier each day. It’s a quieter kind of beauty that asks us to slow down and notice what’s shifting, both around us and within us. Maybe it’s the season, or maybe it’s this stage of Wintering, but warmth feels like both a craving and a lesson. Either way, I'm putting the kettle on.
Hot Water
As the kettle hums, we step into "Hot Water". The promise of warmth sounds like relief, but May doesn’t let us get too comfortable. Instead, she takes us to Iceland, to hot springs and cold air, and invites us to confront how uneasy we’ve become with the idea of rest. Beneath the surface of travel and thermal pools runs a sharper current: a reminder that doing more isn’t always the cure for discomfort, and that sometimes even our efforts to heal can become another form of striving.
We've moved a long way from the time when we saw a recuperative break as a legitimate strategy to aid your recovery. I wonder if there's any room left for recovery at all now. We are either off or on.
If we are "off", it must be because we are physically incapable of being "on". Like a tree struck by lightning: shaken, damaged, needing time and care to heal. In this frame, rest is a curative rather than preventative.
May writes from a well-resourced reality, a relative freedom from which many may feel distant. It was tempting at first to see her insights solely as a reflection of her circumstances. But that reaction only revealed the very tension May circles: the idea that rest is at once a fault, a privilege to be earned, and an unfathomable luxury. We’re taught that endurance proves worth, that rest must be deserved or, better yet, mandated. But if we need or choose to take that break, we risk being seen as broken.
Who has time to rest? What if my reasons aren't "good enough"? What would people think if . . . ?
Recognising the disparity of access to rest doesn't diminish the author's message; it deepens the question of why stillness can feel so fraught. Some have more freedom to pause, others can only imagine it, and in the overlap lie questions of value, productivity, and self-worth. The ache beneath that friction feels shared: the quiet longing for permission to stop without needing to justify it. May’s vulnerable reflection invites us to look closer at that story of endurance and worth to which we so easily cling. Rest isn’t a prize for the deserving or a fault to explain away, but a natural, necessary rhythm written into life itself. Access may differ, but the need is human.
Settling into that awareness, like standing still in a quiet forest after a long hike, brings another theme into focus: the power of simplicity. May invites us to strip life back to its barest form, to find what remains when all the unnecessary layers have been peeled away. In Iceland's clear, cold air, she discovers that clarity often comes with stillness. Many of us have already pared back by necessity, but that doesn't mean we've made peace with it. We still yearn for certainty, for escape, for change [ but not too much change ]. Yet Wintering reminds us that even on the coldest days, there are moments of warmth: a good cup of tea, a beam of sunlight, a crisp morning, a slow exhale. Winter isn't something to flee from, but rather to learn from. Maybe it's not about solving the problem, but safely weathering the storm.
By the end of the chapter, May nearly faints after lingering too long in the sauna, a visceral reminder that the same drive that fuels our growth can leave us depleted. Sometimes doing more is the opposite of what we need. Sometimes the hardest choice is to simply stop; to accept that the warmth we seek is found in surrender. The seasons turn regardless of our effort to outrun them. The cold returns; the sun returns. In that rhythm, we can find peace in the mundane.
That's what you learn in winter: there is a past, a present, and a future. There is a time after the aftermath.
Ghost Stories
I didn't forget about the kettle; the tea was at that freshly boiled point when it demands patience. For a few minutes, it hovers in an in-between state, neither fully settled nor forgotten. November feels a lot like this. In October, the leaves are falling, the light is waning, and Halloween brings a hint of whimsy before the purgatory of late autumn foreshadows the impending winter slumber. Turning inward throughout this season, as May suggests, involves actively noticing and preparing, followed by passively waiting for the storm to come. In Ghost Stories, she asks us to linger in that in-between, to attend to the quiet echoes that shape us, and to find meaning in the spaces we often rush past.
We mourn what is not yet lost and celebrate what has not yet come. A liminal space: both too long and too short, the precipice of ending and beginning. For many, this time of year marks the beginning of a shift in mood. Katherine explores the idea that our present-day struggle with the waning days is partly shaped by changing cultural habits: instead of harvest days culminating with reflection and community, we skip straight to Christmas, chasing the return of the sun. What if we slowed down again? What if we gathered on this precipice of change to pause, to grieve . . . to dance?
As rain pummels the fallen leaves and the nights grow longer, these ghost stories remind us that edges of endings are rarely tidy. There’s a kind of wisdom in the pauses, the echoes, the quiet spaces where fear, grief, and hope coexist. May frames these moments not as obstacles, but as essential contours of our wintering experience: the parts of ourselves we might otherwise ignore, tucked away like whispered tales in a darkened room. For me, reading this chapter felt like sitting quietly with my own shadows while my cup of comforting chamomile steamed within reach, but not yet ready. Turning inward doesn’t mean doing nothing; it means paying attention, making space for what arises, and acknowledging the stories that have shaped us. Sometimes the ghosts are playful, sometimes they are heavy, but their duality offers an invitation to wholeness.
Teatime
Here I prepare to leave you, cradling my cup of tea and carrying both lessons forward: from "Hot Water", the reminder that doing less can sometimes be the most courageous act, and from "Ghost Stories", the invitation to linger in the in-between. Autumn teaches us that preparation and reflection, surrender and curiosity, can coexist; that the pauses we so often overlook are where meaning quietly takes root. Let’s hold these moments with tenderness, and step forward slowly into what comes next.
Next month, we’ll continue with Wintering's November "Metamorphosis" and "Slumber", diving deeper into the ways winter asks us to rest, transform, and embrace the darkness.
If you’d like to continue the ramble with me, you can join the mailing list to be notified when the next reflection appears.
Until then, take good care as you pause, ponder, and wander.
See you on the next page,
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Note: Rambling Reads is a reflective reading series and is not a substitute for therapy or medical support. This is a space where my love of stories meets my work in understanding them.
Cultivating Community: Whenever possible, I encourage borrowing books from your local library or a friend. If you’d like to keep a copy on your shelf while supporting independent bookstores, you can use my affiliate links to Bookshop.org to help keep this ramble going.
