Cottage Letter: January and the squirrel

A reader asked to know more about the Cottage Letters so I thought I’d share a few from last year to give you a sense of what to expect from this mail club.

This letter was sent out last January 2025. If you’d like to get fun letters in the mail, subscribe at the Etsy shop. Each letter comes with an art print.

Dear Reader,

Winter is hiver in French. One letter away from shiver, which is just what this January feels like.

Winter in Italian is inverno, which is one letter away from inferno, which is not like winter at all. Inferno in Italian means hell, which feels more accurate.

With hell in mind, my January started by reflecting on the year that has passed and the messes I’ve made. I looked at last year’s list, scribbled down in what was then my new journal. Plenty of projects are still incomplete. A whole load of dreams unrealized.

So armed I am with proof of how I have failed me.

The worst of the failings is the house. Will there be a DECORATED home like I imagine? Or will it be like it is now, an attempt to corral things and clean surfaces. Or the body. Still didn’t manage to walk off last year’s Christmas feast. Here we are again. Another Christmas under my belt.

As I sit and write to you from my desk, I look out to the yard. I see a tall oak tree in my neighbour’s yard. She told me that a squirrel planted an acorn there thirty-five years ago. When the sapling revealed itself, she left it alone. Planted flowers around it. Watered it along with everything else. Now they have a generous tree providing shade in the summer and a home for squirrels in the winter.

In the crook of two big branches way up high, there is a squirrel nest. Squirrel nests are rather large productions. They need to hold up to wind and snow all winter. I wonder if the squirrel sleeping up there now is a descendant of that original acorn gardener.

The metaphor of an acorn is not lost on me. The entelechy of an acorn is to become an oak tree. The word itself, entelechy, is Greek and it means the perfection within. To reach one's full potential. I used to think it was spelled intellikey, as in the key of inner intelligence. Brilliance that just needs to be unlocked.

Once I stopped beating myself up for last year’s transgressions, mostly in the form of treats (chocolate, stationery, tv) which were in direct violation of the goals I had set out to achieve (skinny, declutter, books), I considered my own entelechy. What is the perfection within that wants to emerge? What needs to be unlocked?

This thought, with all its fresh sparkling promises, is like the first page of the new notebook I just bought myself. Once again, I will write a detailed list of the fantastic new versions of the self to come, as if she is sailing across the sky toward me, just beyond the horizon, soon to appear on my doorstep and merge with me so we are one glowing SUPER ME.

Outside, sunlight on the snow turns every surface glittery. Inside, after a two-week school vacation, every surface was also glittery from crafting with art supplies procured from Santa. After tossing the Christmas tree, sweeping up needles, and wiping up glitter, the house is feeling spacious – like a fresh, clean page of a new notebook.

I have been flipping through seed catalogs and mentally planting a much bigger garden than my actual garden. I’m very good at drawing stars next to pictures of what to order. I’m excellent at overplanning, which brings me back to my list of resolutions. Maybe a few well-crafted letters should suffice. A few more sketches in the year. A few more stretches in the day. More walks. More naps. Less junk.

Last night, we got a rare visit from the Northern Lights. They swirled across the sky in ribbons of green and purple. A celestial showoff who danced in and away without the promise of a second date. I went to bed smiling with them fluttering behind my eyelids.

I woke to the blissful realization that everyone else was still asleep.

I snuck out the door with my winter coat over my pajamas and sat huddled in my rocking chair on the porch.

I love the quiet of the mornings in January after a night of snow.

Snow muffles sound. You can’t hear distant traffic or yapping dogs.

Only a little wind twirling and jostling through the branches. These are precious little pockets of peace before the day gets going. Before the world realizes it’s morning.

I shiver. Hiver. Winter. Time to go inside and start the day. Start the year. Start fresh.

We are convinced this time that things will be different, that we will be different. And perhaps we will. Perhaps this time we will tap into our entelechy and get in touch with the perfection within.

Perhaps we will plant the right seeds in the right place, and in doing so we will unlock something beautiful.

Happy New Year…

Janice