It’s been a hard week. I’m exhausted and going on three weeks of being sick. Dark, cold mornings make it so hard to get out of bed and face my energy-draining job. I have a deadline coming up for my draft, and I’ve been searching for a spark of soul in this manuscript and so scared it’s not there.

Then, last night, when it started to snow, I burst into tears.

I’m not ready for winter. I’m not ready for the darkness, the depression that lingers around the holidays for me. I’m a true-blue Minnesotan who, as the snow fell (and thankfully dissolved on contact with the ground), legitimately thought, “I can’t do another Minnesota winter. I need to escape.”

To where? To what? This is my home.

I’ve been wanting to escape this draft too. But again: to where? To what? Writing is my calling. I’m living my dream. I just can’t find the joy in it.

I’ve been wanting to escape work too. To where, to what? I have a great job with hilarious and loving coworkers and an incredible boss.

I’ve been wanting to escape this … silence I’ve been encountering from God. But “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68). I know I’m not abandoned. I know that. But it doesn’t mean I don’t feel that way sometimes.

I’m. just. so. tired.

Therapy last night was a God-send, even if it meant I had to go out in the rain/snow. My therapist reminded me that all stories are connected to the gospel, and it was what I desperately needed to hear.

I don’t know what I thought– that a book deal would mean perpetual sunshine in my life? I do rejoice that I’ve been given this gift– this opportunity to share my words, live this life– but the winter has still come each year.

Still, I trust that spring is around the corner.

“But that doesn’t mean you stop trusting that the world is being rescued.” Stayed up way too late finishing TRUEST by @jackieleawrites.

— Kristen Ciccarelli (@twocentsparrow) October 29, 2015

@jackieleawrites Not enough YA talks so openly about God, imo, and the way you do it is beautiful and raw and redemptive. ❤

— Kristen Ciccarelli (@twocentsparrow) October 29, 2015