How fun, Tammy! Thank you so much for your sweet comment! Hopefully our paths will cross again in AR. 🙂

Will definitely check that out! You know I love a good book. Thanks for your sweet encouragement, friend! XOXO

thank you for being straight wth your thoughts…not deleting…

C. Roper

John this is amazing! I’m bookmarking this info for sures! Thank you so much!

I’ve visited a lot of places in the North east and Yorkshire, but I always seem
to miss Durham. But it is a lovely city, and of course you must see the
cathedral, ” the greatest Norman building in England, perhaps even in Europe”. And if you get the chance, visit Beamish, the North of England Open Air Museum – http://www.beamish.org.uk/ (but check the opening times as they’re limited in the winter).

Other brilliant places – though you won’t get to visit them all in one

trip – the Northumberland coast, especially its castles (Warkworth, Bamburgh) and Lindisfarne (Holy Island) which was an important centre of Celtic Christianity under Saints Aidan, Cuthbert, Eadfrith and Eadberht and is the source of the Lindisfarne Gospels around 715 AD (now in the British Museum) + the Farne Islands for birds and seals (best in the summer!).
Then there’s Berwick On Tweed with its complete set of Elizabethan town walls, Newcastle on Tyne with its famous bridges and the Angel of the North at Gateshead (Britain’s largest sculpture).

The Stockton and Darlington railway in County Durham is the world’s very first passenger carrying public railway. And in Yorkshire there’s Richmond with its castle and Georgian theare, Ripon with its beautiful cathedral, York (Cathedral, Viking museum, medieval buildings, chocolate factories, and the National Railway Museum), gentile Harrogate, beautiful Wensleydale (home of the eponymous cheese), and the fabulous N York moors.

I think I’ll have to stop there!

I hope you’re feeling better now. Have a good conference.

John

Thanks so much John! This is really thoughtful, and yes, I am certain that the weather/lack of daylight is playing a big part! I’m very ready for spring! I think we’re headed to the North of England for Taido (my husband) to present a paper at Durham in April, so if you have any suggestions/tips, do let me know! Thanks so much!

I’m a British person whose had relatives who suffered from depression, especially in the winter. So one thing that occurs to me is that you might be suffering from “SAD” – short for “Seasonal affective disorder”. This is a type of depression that affects some people in living in high latitudes (like the UK, and particularly in the more northerly parts like Aberdeen) during the winter months.
It’s thought to be a hormonal complaint resulting from lack of exposure to sunlight – which of course occurs during the short days of northern winters, and in Britain is made worse by the preponderance of dull days during winter. This year in particular is the worst for dull rainy winter weather that we’ve had for a long time. Since you’re from the US, which isn’t as far north as the UK, I guess this is the first time you’ve experienced such short winter days and low winter light levels, and maybe your body just isn’t handling it too well right now.

SAD is a mental disorder with a genuinly physical cause, and there’s plenty of info about it on the web, such as:

*The NHS site here: http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/Seasonal-affective-disorder/Pages/Introduction.aspx
*The UK Voluntary Organisation http://www.sad.org.uk/
*And http://www.patient.co.uk/health/seasonal-affective-disorder-leaflet

One way to treat SAD is using light therapy – regular exposure to a high intensity ( at least 10000 lux) daylight lamp or lamps, to simulate the effect of higher sunshine levels – there’s more about this on the sad.org.uk site. Yes, if you’ve got SAD then seeking the light really is likely to work. Also spending as much time outdoors during the winter as possible, like going for a midday walk once a day, also helps.

It would probably make sense to go and talk to your doctor about this. And on a positive note, the days are now getting longer and there’s only 6 weeks to go to the spring equinox, so if you do have SAD you’ll start to feel a lot better before too long. And what’s not to like about the forthcoming spring?

I hope you feel better soon.

John Evans

XOXO friend!

It does bother me that the app costs money! SOOO enjoyed getting to visit with you!! Hoping our paths cross again soon! XOXO