I took Thursday’s late-day stroll at a faster pace than usual, so yesterday I paid the price. Nothing serious, just some soreness and tightness, a reminder that I let the cooler air and that fall feeling push me into moving more quickly than I should have.

In my defense, it was glorious weather. I wasn’t slogging through humid air for a change, and there was an autumnal industriousness afoot, the kind of energy that sends squirrels scampering for acorns to store.

Like the squirrel, I was driven — only it was an experience that I was after, one more walk in a summer made rich by them.