Warmth is a fire place in winter.
Warmth is the love of your family and friends.
Warmth is compassion end empathy.
Warmth is a smile and kindness from strangers.
Warmth is a hug when we are feeling bad.
Warmth is kind words when you are doubting yourself.
Soul connecting hugs …
Fireplaces, hearths, wood. Everything I didn’t experience growing up […]
Also puppies and Xmas music
My dad’s last letter to me—words of encouragement & love, handed to me after he passed for our first Christmas without him. (Amazing how a single paragraph of love can push you through the hardest days. I reread it whenever I need his long-armed hugs.)
Warmth is “Sabrina’s Scarf”
December 2014. Amman. On a bus. Ready to move on. A little girl appeared. Our guide called to us. “Anyone has extra scarf for this girl. She is from the Syrian refugee camp.” My sister Sabrina took off hers.
The smell of cinnamon. The color orange. Coffee. Fresh bread. Low ceilings with dark, oak beams.
For me, warmth is togetherness. Shelter in family & friends. A feeling that, no matter what else is happening or what troubles await, that particular moment is safe, sacred & shareable. It’s a sense of care that endures. […]
As a homeless single teen mother in November of 1981, Friends shared an apartment. 5 adults and three children under age 4. We kept everyone fed (barely) and were warm for that winter. Life sucked badly, but the apartment became our stronghold for 6 months.
Kit …
I grew up poor, our parents only let us turn the heat on when family visited on holidays. When I moved out I fell in love with cast iron radiators. They make strange noises and when I use them I get the sense my grandma is about to arrive for dinner.
“What reminds you of warmth?”
What reminds you of warmth?
— Neil Gaiman (@neilhimself) November 20, 2019
Calling on your words/thoughts for both inspiration and inclusion in a special Twitter story I'm writing for UNHCR & @TwitterForGood to support Syrian @refugees this winter.
Reply to this tweet with #KnitForRefugees.
That was the question [Neil Gaiman][1], posed to his twitter followers, hoping to crowdsource the best thoughts into a short poem to help the [UNHCR][11] with their ***[appeal to help Syrian refugees survive the freezing winter, far from home.][12]***
Easy peasy. How hard could it be?
It was only ridiculously difficult, as it turned out.
The tweet went viral and Gaiman found himself facing twenty five thousand words worth of replies.
And from there, he wove a poem of beauty.
I quote it, in its entirety here.
via The Guardian
What You Need to be Warm by Neil Gaiman
A baked potato of a winter’s night to wrap your hands around or burn your mouth.
A blanket knitted by your mother’s cunning fingers. Or your grandmother’s.
A smile, a touch, trust, as you walk in from the snow
or return to it, the tips of your ears pricked pink and frozen.
The tink tink tink of iron radiators waking in an old house.
To surface from dreams in a bed, burrowed beneath blankets and comforters,
the change of state from cold to warm is all that matters, and you think
just one more minute snuggled here before you face the chill. Just one.
Places we slept as children: they warm us in the memory.
We travel to an inside from the outside. To the orange flames of the fireplace
or the wood burning in the stove. Breath-ice on the inside of windows,
to be scratched off with a fingernail, melted with a whole hand.
Frost on the ground that stays in the shadows, waiting for us.
Wear a scarf. Wear a coat. Wear a sweater. Wear socks. Wear thick gloves.
An infant as she sleeps between us. A tumble of dogs,
a kindle of cats and kittens. Come inside. You’re safe now.
A kettle boiling at the stove. Your family or friends are there. They smile.
Cocoa or chocolate, tea or coffee, soup or toddy, what you know you need.
A heat exchange, they give it to you, you take the mug
and start to thaw. While outside, for some of us, the journey began
as we walked away from our grandparents’ houses
away from the places we knew as children: changes of state and state and state,
to stumble across a stony desert, or to brave the deep waters,
while food and friends, home, a bed, even a blanket become just memories.
Sometimes it only takes a stranger, in a dark place,
to hold out a badly knitted scarf, to offer a kind word, to say
we have the right to be here, to make us warm in the coldest season.
You have the right to be here.
And here he is, narrating it …
Neil Gaiman @neilhimself reads his new poem for refugees "What You Need to Be Warm", woven together from thousands of suggestions he called for on Twitter using #KnitForRefugees. It was written for UNHCR @Refugees winter appeal #r4today | https://t.co/WvyB3SpG7v pic.twitter.com/hf4Q7GeJQ7
— BBC Radio 4 Today (@BBCr4today) December 12, 2019
Neil Gaiman @neilhimself reads his new poem for refugees "What You Need to Be Warm", woven together from thousands of suggestions he called for on Twitter using #KnitForRefugees. It was written for UNHCR @Refugees winter appeal #r4today | https://t.co/WvyB3SpG7v pic.twitter.com/hf4Q7GeJQ7
— BBC Radio 4 Today (@BBCr4today) December 12, 2019So, on this Christmas day, I wish you all warmth!
I wish we be kinder, and more inclusive.
I wish we be more generous.
I pray that we start with the Man in the Mirror.
I pray for more warmth :)
And if you do need reminding, just look at the replies to Neil’s question.
Merry Christmas, all you warm and gorgeous people!
And a Happy New Year!