One of the finest perks of being single is never ever ever having to deal with freezing my bits off in winter again. Scraping ice off all the windows in the car, almost dying of cold on the way to the car, then dying in it for 20 minutes, pipes bursting from the cold, the insane heating bills, how the cold creeps into my bones and only defrosts by the middle of summer. Or Christmas mayhem. Oh I can’t tell you how AMAZING it is to not care a fig about Christmas this year. All that stress, all that Christmas hatred, GONE. I always said since I was little that I wanted to one day grow up and follow the summers around the world. 33 and I’m finally doing it. Little did I know this meant being single. I could have started earlier.

But even as smug as I was feeling about that this morning, I remember… that there was nothing quite like watching my man in the forested yard through a snow-frosted window, shoveling a wide path to impress me with a broken shovel, all the way to the car and the road for half an hour, getting all hot and grumbling and sweaty and yummy smelling while I wait for him, toasting my toes in front of the giant log fire on the ottoman. Fires. I have a thing for them. But there is nothing quite as snuggly as cuddling in front of one on a snowy day in the mountains with a man who smells of fresh sweat, and yesterday’s fire.

But then I remembered that instead of waiting an hour in the snow for a bus today while the wind blasts through my warmest coat icing my bones… at any point I can throw a bikini on and walk down to the point, jump off the tree into the lake and toast my cheeks under the sun.