Getting out of bed in winter is such a cruel task for the likes of me…big warm dog, happy to sleep close, cat purring right into my ear. Only the siren call of coffee and cream and a view of the hillsides pulls me to my feet where snug slippers whisper “there, there” as I slide across the cabin floor. Generations before me, before the civil war, struggled to keep warm within these log walls. Perhaps knowing I have a choice to be elsewhere makes it harder. I grew up with the warm sands of the Gulf of Mexico around my feet in the winter instead of wool slippers. But the trade off is a writer’s dream; quiet, cardinals on the bare branches, unlined skies and best of all only small reminders that other people inhabit the planet when I want to be left alone.