On this Spring Equinox, the March sun is gaining ground, and us Midwesterners have been busy peeling off layers. But I'm not as excited to to reveal my arms as usual. I miss winter in Paonia. When I reflect on my month-long residency at Elsewhere Studios in Paonia Colorado in January of this year, I realize now, with a bit of distance since I returned home, how crucial that time and place was for my art. In Paonia, I was reconnected with my favorite season: winter. The Studio Apartment was a perfect den of light and warmth and silence in which to write. And the world outside was so quiet, so distilled down to basic elements, that my focus was on target like it hadn't been since the COVID-era began. I wrote probably three-hundred pages of the novel I'm now querying, which takes place in Colorado. I grew up in Colorado, though I've lived in the Midwest for twenty years now. And being there, in cold, snowy Paonia, among the starlit mountains, and sunlit fresh snow, I was brought back to my center and grounded in such a powerful way. I forgot what it feels like to write from that kind of calm. I got to experience writing without interruption, without having to force my writing time into scattered, fragmented sections of time. I was reminded of the night sky while walking in the dark, crystal clear, full-moon evenings. I reconnected with the sound of fresh snow dropping off the boughs of a pine tree. I saw sunlight exacting the hexagonal crystals on morning frost. And because of all that, I was able to create. I look forward to seeing Paonia someday in its legendary splendor of summer and harvest season, too. But for now, profound thanks to the good people of Paonia and to Elsewhere Studios for facilitating such a fertile winter- to date, the most formative time in my career.