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Category: seasons

A Walk Recorded

A Walk Recorded

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I took a stroll late yesterday through the gloaming, the exquisite though way-too-early gloaming — I was walking between 4 and 5! — then came home and wrote these words:

The late fall light is draining quickly from the sky and a bright near-half moon showing itself. There are the most delicate of evening sounds: a few hardy crickets, the bird that says “Judy” (did I determine that’s a wren?) and various human-caused sounds — a pinging that could have come from a small forge but was likely a kid banging on a pipe — the distant downshift of a passing truck. But none of these sounds disturbed the peacefulness of the landscape. They only enhanced it. 

Some of the shorter shrubs have lost most of their leaves. Those that remain seem to be offering themselves for viewing, like golden coins on a platter. Back on my street, the russets and scarlets of the maples and oaks shimmered in the twilight. 

Night falls fast this time of year, but when it’s warm, as it has been today, that doesn’t seem to matter as much.

Inside Again

Inside Again

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The house this morning has the feel of Noah’s ark two days into the 40. Only it’s not animals seeking refuge this morning; it’s plants.

As temperatures plunged into the 20s, we brought in the ferns and the spider plant and the cactus. They are hunkered down here where temps are in the upper 60s, heading for a high of 70 once the furnace moves to its daytime setting. Because some of the plants are so large they must be moved in on little dollies, they will stay inside now till spring.

The moving of the plants is one of those autumnal rites of passage I try to put off as long as possible. Turning on the heat in the house is another one. On both accounts we’ve made it to November, which I can hardly complain about.

But I will add a wistful note, a plea to the weather gods. It’s nothing personal, nothing against the plants themselves. But I hope it won’t be long before they can be outside again.

Three Layers

Three Layers

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Three layers on today, plus wool socks and, at least for the moment, a hoodie over my head. It’s been months since I put on this many sweaters. Must be November!

Life without seasons holds no appeal, would be flat and boring. But as daylight shrinks and cold winds blow, I feel a shiver that comes not just from the cold upstairs room where I write these days. It comes, too, from the knowledge of what awaits us.

The leaves that glitter golden now will soon fall, turn brown, need raking. The winds will shudder in from the west, bowing the bamboo and penetrating even the hardy siding.

Even though I try to live in the moment, to take each challenge as it comes, it’s hard not to anticipate this perpetual, seasonal one, the dying of the light.

Golden Leaves

Golden Leaves

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Midway through this mellow month, I sit outside at my “deck desk” with the backyard spread before me. The grass looks far less lush than it did a few months ago, the brown patches more numerous. But much effort has gone into that lawn, and I appreciate the grassy patches where they grow.

At the far back of the lot sits the new garden bench, its right side ever so slightly higher than its left, a detail I noticed only after I had posted the photo in a post about its arrival. 

That small imperfection fits the yard, melds perfectly with the weeds and the section of missing fence and the stray patches of poison ivy that are still here despite our best efforts. 

It’s not a pristine backyard, but there are birds chirping and ornamental grasses flourishing and golden leaves that catch the light. 

Hand Outstretched

Hand Outstretched

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I returned to an autumn landscape: acorns underfoot, leaf litter, the late-summer growth of the climbing rose. I love this second bloom, have written about it before, will always be touched by it.

Today I see the fall roses as a valentine to summer, a hand outstretched with a bouquet.

Here, take this, goes the caption. Take these poesies with you into the next season, the one of chill winds and scant foliage. Let them remind you that spring will come again.

To October

To October

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It’s the first day of a new month, “the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,” a phrase that has stayed with me since I read Keats’ “To Autumn” in high school. 

What I don’t remember are the later phrases, these sumptuous descriptions: “close-bosom friend of the maturing sun” or “to bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees” or these lines from the final stanza: 

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,–
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft,
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

I’ve nothing to add to that! 

Saturday Morning

Saturday Morning

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It’s cool and crisp today;. The witch hazel and the weeping cherry are starting to turn, but most trees are green, and pools of shade and light still dot the lawn. 

Along the fence row, the ornamental grasses have settled in, grown up and out. They catch the light, their tassels gleaming. And the ferns, replenished by rain, are verdant again.

In between feeding runs, a hummingbird perches on the slim twig of the climbing rose, which bends slightly with its tiny weight. 

I have the feeling I often have when struck by natural beauty — that I’d like to hold it, inhale or imbibe it, anything to keep it here. 

Autumn Amble

Autumn Amble

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The warm and weighty air we’ve enjoyed lately has camouflaged what’s been going on close to the ground, where low branches have been thinning and yellowing. Where crimson and yellow leaves have mixed in with the green.  

 It was if the scenery had been clued into the equinox, which in a way it had, I suppose. A woods that looked summery just a few days ago seemed to morph overnight into an autumnal landscape. 

I noticed this yesterday on my post-farmers-market stroll, a lovely routine that my newly freed up work status has allowed me to enjoy. The woods near there has a blend of trees and enough underbrush that turns early in the season to burnish the place with gold, to stamp it with the season. 

But up above, there is still plenty of green. Time for many more autumn ambles. 

Wednesday Market

Wednesday Market

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I remembered just in time yesterday, remembered that it was Wednesday and the farmer’s market was happening in my church parking lot. The church doesn’t sponsor the market, just offers it a place to be. But having it there gives it a welcome familiarity.

As the summer has deepened, the produce offerings have expanded — and so has the carnival aspect of the event. Yesterday the parking lot was so full that I thought for a moment a service must be going on. But it wasn’t a service, just a lot of vegetable-lovers — and more. 

This market includes bakery booths and a barbecue place, organic meats and micro-greens. A steel drum player gives it a Caribbean beat. As I squeezed tomatoes and peaches, I spotted a fleet of cyclists moving effortlessly down the road. For a moment it felt like summer would never end. 

Fluff in Fall

Fluff in Fall

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I turned the corner onto Lawyers Road the other day (yes, there is a road called Lawyers here, one called Courthouse, too), and ran right into a cloud of milkweed fluff, a passel of winged silk flying in the wind. Only the warm air flowing through the car reminded me that I wasn’t driving into snow flurries.

More gardeners are cultivating the milkweed plant now for the monarch butterflies it attracts and protects, which may explain the proliferation of fluff. 

And what a perfect time of year to receive it, perfect for the milkweed most of all, but also perfect for humans, who are more likely this time of year to have crispy leaves or hard acorns falling on our heads, whose imaginations are beginning to take on the more realistic, less whimsical cast of fall and winter.

Fluff seems a springtime thing, as gossamer as our gardens are in April or May, more like cherry tree petals, which also swirl around in a light breeze. Fluff in fall runs counter to our expectations. It helps us dream.

(Photo courtesy Stockvault)