Layers

You could add layer after layer, blanket after blanket, 3, 4, 5 toppings for your cocooned self, trying to hide from the world and the cold in bed but painfully aware that lying down too much will eventually make your back weak and sore. You could try to hide not only from the cold that drifts in through poorly sealed windows and doors but also from the thoughts of another year that passed and brought you 365 days closer to some ephemeral post-peak or maybe a not so ephemeral descent into creaky limbs and bones. Maybe you could look back on the good and try to smile but it's so easy to lie still and gloss over that and focus on the negatives while the cold air accosts you, the water on your face from washing that you didn't fully dry, your feet at the edge of the bed that stick out from under several of the layers, lips chapped and skin on your hands parched no matter how much greasy, oily residue you leave on them from some overpriced artificial eucalyptus product. And with the darkness seemingly permanent and a perpetual state from 5pm to 8am the thoughts can be dark too for much longer, no warmth or light to break through the conflagration of regret or missed resolve or what ifs and whatever else your aging self perpetuates that always feels a bit too old to comfortably say out loud no matter how young you really are. And maybe you grab the blankets from the inside so as to not leave your arms open to the elements and try to scrunch and bundle them up closer and a little sigh will escape and you'll realize that you can only hide under the layers for so long, and that eventually, everything has to come out.