seeping cold

It's cold.

The windows, single-glazed, allow heat transfer from inside to outside, and cool the artificially heated rooms. Flowery curtains, draped down past the window ledges, can't stop the air cooling as the round, blaring heaters blast heat then pause, waiting till the room cools again, to continue pumping heated air that merges and cools with colder air.

Outside there is pervasive silence. Not even a drip from the eaves can be heard; the sky is quieted after its explosion of frozen and liquid water that speeded to earth from the skulking masses of gray earlier today. The hail that fell whitely on the neighbour's roof tops, has melted, freezing the tin and trickled down the pipes into the sinking gardens.

The chill of the day bespeaks the reason for my attire. I'm sitting here, in the shadow of the bunk bed, thinking. About lives in transition, and character building through difficulties, of what loneliness is and the need to be true to oneself. Secretly, I'm glad about my warm winter clothes.

They're not pretty to look at. If they were, they would be departing from their function as snug, roomy, thick, protective layers - designed to keep the warmth in and the chill out, not at all meant to be attractive to the eye. I'm wearing my study pants: thick knitted woolen slouch-pants, navy in colour and high-waisted. They're an oddity that I was happy to find at an opshop around the corner; at our first meeting I knew that our relationship would be a deep and abiding one, that they would be my study pants and that they would be excellent protection in the cold winter. I was utterly right; I've worn them a couple of times so far (I only picked them up last week) and they have proved snug and altogether suitable for long bouts of study.

The other important study gear that I'm wearing at the moment is a fine, machine-knitted woolen gray jersey. It used to be a man's jersey (men get it good when it comes to clothing) but is admirable for my purposes. It's hugely big, but it's warm with its baggy stomach-area, and its mammoth sleeves. Over the jersey I'm wearing a large, green jacket that sports a hood lined with some synthetic, fluffy material.

These are the necessary elements of studying in winter. What are your favourite things to wear when it starts to freeze outside?

- Lydie