It's Still February

And you have permission to be shitty.

Do you feel like doing nothing? 

February is hard. February in Canada is hard. Hell, February in California must be hard without the weather to blame. 

Other hard things: 

• CRA tax installment requests

• Starting work

• Stopping work

• Being creative

• Not being creative

• An ass that just won’t quit (just felt like saying this)

• Working out 

• Tight pants

• Cleaning

• Being busy

• Being bored

• A broken fridge

• Making either/or decisions

• Having Gary Busey’s hair (texture and colour)

Being an adult is hard. Doing things you don’t want to do is hard. Doing things you want to do can be hard.

So, what if we let ourselves off the hook? What if we built in guilt-free time to be lowly, pieces of shit and let it out of our system? 

We’re talking about a free pass to cancel the workout. To load and unload carts on Athropologie with reckless *abandon*. To conquer the entire tray of brownies.

What would happen if we listened to the devil on our shoulder and said, “Not today, Satan—it’s February!”? What if we permit a “skip a day”—the polar opposite of a Friday Night Lights two-a-day? What if we refused anything and everything productive?

Would this unlock a tsunami of dead-beatedness from which we’d never recover? Would it be liberating? Make us feel worse?

I don’t know, but I plan to find out.

I have a theory that Canadians are great at art and often eclipse the funniness and general goodness of Americans (sorry, not sorry) because we have seasons. We have weather-determined downtime. We have built-in suffering.

We have February.

The seasons humble us and force adaptation and creativity. They make us put in and take out cottage docks. They turn us inward and endorse the practicality of year-round Blundstones.

If we had surf and sun instead of squelchy lawns and grey skies, we’d lose our edge. And while this edge makes us hard and scaly skinned, it adds something. But there comes a time, when this earned edge entitles us to let go.

So, here’s my proposal: instead of pretending we’re in sunny California, why don’t we let the weather wear us? Let’s listen to our instincts, cancel all plans, down a bottle of merlot, go topless in a fur jacket, and close-eyed sing to lyrics of our own design!

Or like, whatever your version of “being shitty in Feb” looks like ^.

When we were growing up, my Mom endorsed “mental health days” (she was ahead of her time). And every so often, she’d creak open our bedroom door and recognize a heightened teenage grunt. As a response, she’d ask, “go out for breakfast?” or “take the day off and go shopping?”. 

Generally, I’d say “no” and schlep through the day’s regular programming. I didn’t want to miss a class or let anyone get used to my absence. But occasionally, I’d run the numbers and agree to play hooky. And it was never regrettable. It would clear the system and break up monotony.

Instead of schlepping through the to-do’s, green smoothies, or overtime—what if we didn’t? What if we were our own bad-influence guardian and gave into healthy rebellion? As a Canadian in February, you’ve earned it.

Your bedroom door has just been creaked open. If you want it, take it.