Appreciating November

This is the part of the year when I always want to stop time.

Where’s the pause button?, I find myself asking as I look out the window at the bare gray tree branches and the lawn carpeted with brown leaves.

This isn’t about apprehension over the oncoming holidays. I like all the oncoming holidays, and I like most of the rituals and festivities associated with them, and the ones I don’t like, I try to avoid.

No, my wish to stand still, right in this one spot in mid-November, is just about needing a little more time to savor one of the very best parts of the year. The air is dry and cool: perfect for long runs.  The frigid temperatures haven’t yet descended; nor have the snow and ice.  Cold weather in the forecast means merely to turn the heat up a little, not to expect another blizzard.

And the natural world around us is just so beautiful at this time of year. The golden hayfields. The blue sky. The variegated browns and whites of the tree trunks and branches. It’s not magnificent, like the October foliage colors, nor breathtaking, like a new snowfall. Its beauty comes from its simplicity.

True, the air is growing steadily colder and the sunlight hours ever shorter. I don’t mean to suggest I’d want to live in this exact season all year round. I’d miss both the intense heat of summer and the intense cold of winter. I’d miss the smell of damp earth from the spring and the warm Indian summer afternoons of October.

But this part goes by too quickly. Once Thanksgiving is past, it starts to feel like winter and like the holiday season, both of which are appealing in their own way but also busy and noisy and demanding.

November is such a quiet time. The earth is so still and quiet and seems to demand so little right now, as the ground freezes over and growing ceases.

It’s time for cocooning and preparing for winter. Then after that, more beautiful seasons. But for now, it’s November, and nothing could be more beautiful than this.

Apple picking time

Holly and I went apple picking last weekend, just as we do nearly every fall, only this year we got a jump on the apple season. Normally we forget to go until Columbus Day weekend, which is the last weekend most orchards are open, and then we scramble to find one whose website confirms it still has apples available for picking.

This year, we thought of it early, and we had our choice of locations. I’d never even gone in early October before, let alone late September. We felt so organized, so ahead of the curve.

And somewhat to my surprise, it was markedly more fun than usual because the apples, while plentiful, were less abundant than they are in mid-October. So we had to actually search a little bit to find our bounty, which made it more like an Easter egg hunt, more adventurous. In mid-October, apple picking is the proverbial low-hanging fruit. Also high-hanging fruit, mid-hanging fruit, and fruit all over the ground. It was fun to go at a time that the task still required a little expenditure of effort.

Actually, any kind of intrigue or challenge makes apple picking more fun. In general, it’s one of those things you do because it’s seasonally appropriate but not really all that interesting a way to spend the afternoon. I love being outside in the fresh air and sunshine of an apple orchard on a fall day, but I’d much rather be hiking than standing around collecting apples. And it takes so little time before the bags get so heavy. I also have a guilty little secret in that I have what can best be described as pedestrian tastes when it comes to apples. I like soft, sweet apples, whereas New England orchard apples tend to be crisp and tart. Intellectually, I know that’s what sophisticated apple consumers favor, but I like the round supermarket Macintoshes with the almost squishy pulp.

While I wandered amidst the trees trying to convince myself that surely I must be getting at least a modicum of physical exercise, Holly filled two bags, one with Cortlands and one with Macouns. Back home with dinnertime approaching, Holly made an apple crisp. I cut up the apples for her, wondering as I do every year while making apple crisp whether Los Angeles street gangs make a dessert they call apple Crips, but Holly did the rest of the work: mixing the topping, melting the butter, blending in the egg. Emerging from the oven an hour later was a hot, fragrant, spicy apple crisp, a perfect way to end the weekend.

Holly and I each had one serving; Rick, who avoids desserts, tried just a bite; and Tim ate the rest. Holly mildly scolded Tim for eating so much of it, but I think she was secretly flattered. If she wants to make another one, we could always go again. There’s still nearly three weeks left of the season. And surely I can manage one more afternoon of apple picking, even if I still maintain that as leisure time activities go, it’s more picturesque than fun. It’s a decent way to spend an autumn afternoon. And the apple crisp – or apple Crips, if you’re a gang member – makes it all worthwhile.

Spring springs slowly

It took a long time for spring to arrive this year.

The leaves all blew off the trees during Hurricane Sandy late last October, and the branches have been bare ever since. Bare enough to disappear under the two feet of snow that fell during Snowstorm Nemo, and the many inches that fell before and after that February storm.

And then the snow finally melted, and the branches stayed bare for weeks longer. The air was chilly and the ground hard and brown. I didn’t think about it much until we traveled south to Washington, D.C. in mid-April. There, in the warm sunshine, with freshly sprouted grass and blossoming trees all around us, the kids seemed to open up just like the blossoms, playing and exulting in the warm air they’d missed out on for so many months.

When we returned home, though, our lawn was still brown, our trees still bare, our shrubbery gray. There had even been a little bit of sleet in our absence.

So we waited. And then finally in the past week or so, our world turned green, the vibrant green of spring. Tiny leaves appeared on the trees and bushes. The grass on our lawn grew in bright green as well. Sunlight warmed the air. The kids and I started playing badminton nightly after dinner in the fading sunlight, something we never do when it’s below about 60 degrees. Yesterday at her painting class, Holly sat on a mat in the grass and painted a patch of yellow and purple flowers, so now we have a painting in the dining room with colors as vivid as those outside, where the daffodils that were planted long before we moved here are blooming once again.

Yet when I went for a walk after dinner last night, I noticed how many branches still didn’t have any leaves, how many patches of lawn have yet to grow in, how many buds on our neighbors’ apple trees haven’t opened yet. And somehow that was comforting too. It reminded me that this doesn’t all happen at once: spring has been magnificent these past several days, but there’s still more of it to come. Seasons in New England tend to unfold slowly, and it was good realize that we’ll keep discovering new blossoms and fresh greenery for weeks to come.

It would be a mistake to rush through this phase of slow blossoming. Summer, with its holidays and vacations and trips, carries with it more overt excitement and celebration than spring. Spring has a quieter splendor, and this week I’m reminding myself to stop counting the days until summer vacation and enjoy every moment of May.

The emerald woods of June

“The woods are lovely, dark and deep.”

I know Robert Frost was referring to the winter woods when he wrote this; in the same poem he refers to those woods “filling up with snow.” But I keep thinking of those words this month, as I gaze into the lovely, dark and deep woods just behind my house.

Earlier in the spring we were in a drought, but since then we’ve had plenty of nourishing rainfall, interspersed with warm sunny days: perfect growing weather. My father and the other farmers in town have already done their first hay cutting, but the cows look like hay is the farthest thing from their minds right now, with all the thick green grass to graze upon in their pastures.

At my house, though, the view is of woods, not pastures, and it looks like a rainforest around here this month. The leaves on the oak, elm and maple trees are lush and emerald, almost blocking out the sunlight so that the forest floor is dark. The trails I walk on are swathed with fern fronds and moss. It’s as if a brilliant green haze has suffused from the tops of the trees down to the ground.

And it’s not only the leaves and grasses and shrubs that make the forest seem so lush right now. Birds tweet all day long; owls hoot at night and sometimes in the afternoon as well. (Since moving to this house by the woods, I’ve been surprised to hear owls at all times of day. Was I wrong to think they were strictly nocturnal?) Peepers and bullfrogs call from the ponds. Yesterday I saw a small but very furry fox trot across our lawn. Turtles of many sizes cross the roadway near streams, and last week I spotted a hummingbird near the kitchen window.

Other wildlife is less present in this weather, which is in its own way a sign of the abundance of this growing season. The deer we usually see at the edge of the driveway have been absent lately, indicating that they’re finding enough food in the forest not to venture so close to the house. And it’s been a while since I’ve heard coyotes at night, a normal sound all throughout the winter.

Insects abound in the moist warm air of June as well: butterflies and dragonflies, but also ticks and mosquitoes. Sleeping with the windows open means putting up with gnats, tiny enough to infiltrate the screens, in the bedroom.

It’s a beautiful time of year, full of birdsongs and the fragrance of flower blossoms as well as grass that grows faster than we can keep it mowed and weeds that need to be yanked from the herb garden almost daily. The woods are indeed lovely, dark and deep – with growth, in this case, rather than with snow. June is in full bloom, and the rich dank warm air beckons me to get outside and breathe it all in before the season changes yet again.

Spring ahead (even if it's not spring)

I’m still not accustomed to the earlier date for starting daylight saving time.

Even in this winter-less winter, it feels too early to have sunlight at dinnertime. Daylight saving seems like it should be a precursor to summer, and that made sense when it used to fall in April, once spring was well under way. To have the clocks change before winter has even ended – by the calendar if not by the thermometer – still seems strange to me.

And yet it’s hard not to welcome the extra daylight, and the irrepressible surge of energy it brings. Losing an hour is hard for me; harder than it should be – as I said to my 19-year-old niece yesterday, I keep thinking someday I’ll be an organized and caught-up enough person that one hour really won’t make a difference to me either way, but unfortunately I’m not there yet – but it’s hard to argue with the tradeoff. Seeing sunlight last well into the early evening is inspiring, no matter when it occurs.

So I struggled to get out of bed at seven Sunday morning, intent on starting what felt like a new season with the change of clocks on the right foot rather than letting myself sleep in. The kids both slept late, not having any interest in making an effort to adjust to the new time, and that gave me hours in the morning with which I would have liked to read the Sunday papers but instead completed my 2011 mileage chart to send our tax accountant. Tedious, but necessary; and a decent way to make good use of the morning.

Energized by the sunshine, I tinkered a little bit with making parts of the house look nicer – rearranging knickknacks, putting away paperwork -- and Rick got the the kids to tidy up the playroom while I was out running. By the end of the day, we all felt as if we’d done a touch of spring cleaning.

The sunlight lasted well past dinnertime. Yes, it’s still technically winter, but the clocks have changed and the daylight stretches into the evening now, which to my mind makes it feel more like the onset of spring than any change in temperature could. Longer days are coming, and with them summer. It was a beautiful start to a new season.

Snowless winter

It’s been a warm, snowless winter.

And in some ways, that’s not so bad. Last winter was the snowiest winter I could remember, the snowiest winter in fifty years, the snowiest winter on record – I don’t remember how it was defined, but parents of school-aged kids came up with their own term for it: a winter so snowy that even the kids stopped thinking snow days were fun.

Snowbanks that looked more like walls than piles lined the roadway. Plow drivers complained that there was so place left to put the snow.

Not this winter. After one bizarre and unseasonable storm two nights before Halloween, we’ve had just a dusting here, a dusting there. Traces of white on the tree branches now and then, but no sledding, no snowmen. All fall, as I walked along the trails of the state park behind our new house, I thought “These trails will be great for showshoeing,” but my snowshoes remain in the exact same place where I put them when the movers unloaded them last April.

Thre’s a lot less inconvenience to a warm snow-less winter. No scraping sound of the plow driving by before dawn. No clearing snow and ice from the windshield after work. No pestering the kids to shovel a path for the dog, who refuses to go to the bathroom in drifts as high as her stomach.

And we’re certainly saving money on the plowing, or lack thereof.

But I could use a snowy day right about now. Sure, we all romanticize the school cancellations of our childhoods. We all reminisce about long days passed in snowball fights interrupted only for servings to hot chocolate or a fresh batch of cookies from the oven. And we all grow up to learn about a different kind of snow day: the kind when you absolutely have to get to work for a ten o’clock meeting or drive 45 minutes down the icy, blizzarded-in highway for a long-scheduled doctor’s appointment just as the no-school text message arrives from the superintendent’s office.

Yes, we all at some point in adulthood experience a moment of snowstorm-induced stress, after which we wonder what happened to those wonderful stormy days remembered in rosy shades from our youth.

But having no snow has taken us too far to the other extreme. I’m tired of mud. I want to wake to the strange grayish light of snow covering the skylights over the bed. I want to hear the kids cheer when I tell them there’s no school today. I wouldn’t even mind hearing them plead for bacon and waffles, a special breakfast for a special day. (Last year, there were so many “special day” breakfasts on snowdays that I began to worry about my son’s cholesterol level.)

Instead, I woke today to bare ground, bare branches, bare sky. Last winter at this time there were four feet of snow on the ground. We took pictures of the rail fence with the snow reaching the highest rail, of the wooden swing with snow up to its seat, of the kids diving into snowdrifts taller than them, and we dreamed of summer.

This year there’s nothing to wish away, no need to dream of warmer days. And there’s a sense of something remiss in that. Perhaps we need the snowbanks to remind us of beaches, the snowdays to remind us of summer vacation. Without duress, there can be no welcome rush of relief. And as the mushy, mild days roll on, I wonder if we’ll notice when spring arrives.

A snow-free winter wonderland

“Winter wonderland” is one expression we haven’t heard much this season. Just as in the Christmas carol of that name, it usually seems more applicable to a snow-covered landscape with ice crystals and fluffy white drifts than the barren brown expanse that so far has typified winter of 2011/12 in New England.

But last week on the NPR show Science Friday, host Ira Flatow and his panel of guests – including an astronomer, a meteorologist and a naturalist – gave that very name to their discussion of winter, and devoted the hour to all the ways in which winter is indeed a wonderland even without snowmen, snowflakes and sledding.

And as I look around, I have to agree. True, there’s something unnerving about a relatively warm, snow-free winter, but absent the irrefutable romance of snow, I’m reminded of all the other wonders of winter. The full moon was unusually bright last weekend; an article in the Boston Globe explained that the moon looks brighter in the winter because the sun is so low, detracting less from the light of the moon. The experts on Science Friday discussed other aspects of astronomy and meteorology that make the nature of winter unique as well, even without snow.

I’ve been walking in the woods almost daily ever since Christmas. The frozen ground is easy to navigate; what were muddy puddles and damp earthen patches in the fall are now solid ruts that make for easy balance. The bare branches yield to long sight lines through the forest. Ice edges the brooks and ponds, making lacy scalloped patterns contrasted against the black water. In the morning, gray dusk seeps slowly down from the sky while I’m already well into breakfast preparations. The sun, still so low in the sky, slants against the tree trunks to create dramatic angular shadows late in the day.

Sometimes, on mild spring days or warm summer evenings, I wonder how it could possibly not be preferable to live someplace with a year-round warm climate. Once we are far from winter on the calendar, it’s sometimes hard for me to remember that this frozen season has its own merits.

But in the cold, still air of January, the earth feels quiet and invites contemplation. And so this is the time of year, with or without snow, that I remember just what about winter makes it a wonderland, year after year.

Unseasonably warm

It seems that people generally fall into two camps regarding the unseasonably warm weather with which December of 2011 has begun. Some, like my friend Jenn, are saying “The holiday season just isn’t the same without frosty air and snowflakes. Where’s the weather to set the mood? When can we say it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas?” Others are just happy to be catching what feels like a little reprieve before true winter kicks in.

In past years, December has been a cold and snowy month, though last year’s epic snow accumulation didn’t begin in earnest until the day after Christmas. Nonetheless, this week’s temperatures in the sixties seem to mean something to everyone, whether positive or negative.

I’m a little reticent to admit it, but at the moment, I fall into the reprieve camp. I say “reticent” because relishing the unseasonably warm weather makes me feel, well, old. There was a time when I found snowstorms romantic; frigid mornings inspiring; icy ponds and frost-crusted branches magical. But that time was decades ago, when the driveway seemed to magically plow itself and the ultimate crowning touch to a snowy day was a school cancellation the next morning.

There are still plenty of things I like about winter weather. Snowshoeing, for one thing; and I’m looking forward to snowshoeing even more this winter because of all the trails near our new house. I like the surprise of getting to sleep a little bit late because school is closed and the kids don’t have to catch the bus. I like watching Tim and Holly go sledding together. I like the way the fields and woods throughout our town look when blanketed with snow.

And perhaps it’s only because I’m so sure all of that will still come within the next few months – or maybe weeks – that it’s easy for me to say I’m enjoying this unseasonably mild weather. But the fact is, temperatures in the 60’s or even 40’s, with the ground still dry, simply make life easier than deep snow and crusty ice. Last night was our annual town tree lighting. For the past several years, the weather has been uniformly freezing for that event: adults stamp their feet and dab at their runny noses while kids run in circles to stay warm while we sing carols and wait for Santa’s arrival by firetruck. True, it’s a little harder to be in the Santa mood when you can stand outside during the tree lighting in a sweater rather than a parka, but it still seemed like an easier evening overall this year than it has recently.

The weather is expected to change in the next day or two, and maybe then I’ll finally get some Christmas shopping and decorating done. Snow and cold are definitely a catalyst to getting into the holiday mood, as I learned when we had a foot of snow in late October and Holly started talking about her Christmas wish list even though it wasn’t yet Halloween. “It feels like Christmas!” she said on that October 30, and it did. Now it feels like September. But September is a beautiful month, and I’m going to breathe deeply of the mild damp air and enjoy it just a little more before I have to dig boots and gloves out of the basement for another long winter.

November elegy

I wish November could last forever.

But then, almost every year I wish November, or at least the first two weeks of it, could last forever.

This month in particular, though, it’s increasingly obvious that we are in the midst of the most perfect few weeks of the whole year. October impresses with warm days and blazing colors, but in November, the pale gold sunlight streams through the bare branches and slants across the burnished dying grass on the fields. Mild days like we’ve had this week seem like a remarkable gift this late in the season, especially after the snowstorm with which October ended. I’ve gone running in temperatures in the mid-50’s the past few mornings, and it seems like such an unexpected bonus.

This is a quiet time of year, a time for in-gathering. Fall sports are wrapping up. The school year is well under way; the kids are comfortably established in their classroom routines, but it’s still too early for major projects or productions. The report cards, conferences and concerts that mark the end of a term are still several weeks away.

And just as far away, mercifully, are the holidays. Well, not quite. Thanksgiving is next week, and I should already be planning the menu and table settings, but it feels like even that can wait a few more days, maybe ‘til the weekend. As for Christmas and New Year’s festivities, I won’t even think about that until we’ve finished cleaning up the kitchen after Thanksgiving dinner.

This is a quiet week. I’m immersed in work and community events, and fitting in as much time outdoors as I can while the weather is still so mild. With the early sunsets, the filtered November daylight seems all the more vital.

Next week, I’ll start thinking about Thanksgiving, and then figuring out the December schedule with all its parties and events, and then Christmas itself. This week, I’m just savoring the quiet and peace and beautiful days of mid-November.

Feeding season again

It’s a mid-fall seasonal ritual: the resumption of livestock feeding.

From May through October, the cows graze. That makes life easier for the rest of us. I see them as I drive by or run alongside their pastures, but I don’t interact with them much. They graze and mingle in the fields; I focus on human pursuits.

But for the other six months of the year, I spend time with them daily. I head out to the barn in the morning and they follow me right up to the gate. I climb the ladder to the hayloft and they stand below, watching me. I shoulder my way among them to move a bale or cut the twine around the hay and they subtly shove back, reminding me that my shoving is no match for their shoving. Or even their gentlest nudging, for that matter.

I’ve been doing the cows’ daily feeding on my parents’ farm for the past three years, not out of obligation but because I was outdoors on the earlier side of the morning anyway, letting the dog run around and then going running myself, and it just made sense to take on this responsibility since I was right there already.

But for the past several months, I thought my job with the animals was over. The logistics of farm life have changed over the course of the year; now there is a significantly greater number of animals in the herd, and also more farmhands involved, so I was told there was no need for me to continue.

But rituals, like habits and water, have a way of carving their own paths. I had thought the herd had become too large in number for me to navigate my way around comfortably, but then for husbandry purposes they were separated into small groups in three different pastures. And it turned out I was still the first one out in the barnyard in the morning, letting the dog play and getting ready for my daily run. So once again, it just made sense for me to climb up to the hayloft and throw down some bales while I was out there anyway.

And even though it seemed like giving up this duty might not be such a bad change when I contemplated it a few months ago – surely that extra ten or fifteen minutes every morning that I’d save from not entering the barnyard would come in handy – now that I’m back into the feeding routine, I’m so glad I didn’t have to give it up after all.

I love the way the animals watch me walking toward the barn, the way they low in anticipation of their morning meal, the way they mill and shuffle and edge each other around as they wait for me to make my slow way to the hay supply. I like the way they lower their big faces into the bales once I finally deliver on my promise, and the way they ignore me as I make my way between them once they’re eating.

It’s not an affectionate personal relationship like the one I have with my dog…or my kids. I just like being around them. It’s been part of my day during the cold-weather seasons for the past three years. I know they don’t particularly care who shows up in the barnyard at eight o’clock each morning. My company doesn’t mean anything different to them than any other human’s. But their company means something to me. It’s a tradition, and I’m happy that once again this November, the bovines and I are spending time together.

Summer fruits

I’m eating one last plum. One small, soft, juicy, purple-black plum, its pulp sweet and cold, its skin tart and fibrous. One last plum before the summer fruit season ends.

Many of my friends talk about the mixed feelings of changing over their wardrobes from summer to fall: the end of cotton skirts and sleeveless blouses; the ushering-in of wool sweaters and blazers and suede boots. This year, with warm humid temperatures extending into the beginning of October, some of them have sounded more eager than wistful about saying goodbye to bathing suits and sandals and reaching for their autumnal wardrobe.

For me, the wardrobe turnover isn’t all that meaningful. It’s in the fruit crisper that I mark – and lament – the change of seasons.

Goodbye to sweet white peaches, tangy yellow peaches, intensely flavored apricots, red and purple and black plums. Goodbye to complicated cherries, delicious despite their tangle of stems and messy pits, and nectarines, the fruit that seems to have an agreeable disposition, neither as sloppy as peaches nor as mealy as apricots.

Goodbye to summer vegetables as well: plump sweet corn kernels lined up along the cob; dark flavorful tomatoes in blobby irregular spheres.

I’m not adamant about locavorism, mostly because I can’t imagine forever giving up bananas, avocadoes and coffee. But the very best of the summer fruits and vegetables simply aren’t available in the supermarket off-season. And even without being proactively locavore, I appreciate the annual rhythms of the harvest: asparagus in the spring, an abundance of juicy tomatoes and fruits, and flavorful lettuces, in the summer, pears and apples in the fall, oranges and grapefruit in the winter.

So today I say goodbye to summer’s delicious stone fruits. One more perfect plum, and then eight or nine months without. Time to turn to the autumnal harvest for cooking and snacking inspiration. The wheel of the year turns, and we’re at the start of a new season, once again.

Springtime arrives

The weekend was mild and sunny, but yesterday was even better than that: warm and truly spring-like. The very last pile of snow finally disappeared from our yard. I went running in a t-shirt and tights: two layers fewer than I’ve worn for the five preceding months.

My aunt sent us a floral arrangement late last week as a housewarming present, and the flowers are filling the kitchen with perfume. I placed them on the table near the deck and opened the glass door to let the fresh air flow in through the screen. Even though I knew the flower scent was coming from the bouquet indoors and not from anything blooming outdoors, it made me think the ground was softening and shoots might soon appear; maybe flowers too. We don’t know, since this yard is new to us, what might be planted in the mulch beds around the house, but maybe the scent of outdoor blossoms will soon grace our yard.

The grass covers the ground only very thinly, and much of it is still straw-colored, but the smell of fresh dirt in the air makes me think we’ll soon find fresh green grass growing. I can still see far into the woods surrounding our house; the oaks are bare and even the evergreens seem scraggly, but the warm air reminds me that the leaves, like the grass, will soon enough be thick and green. The walk we did through the woods Sunday gave us the chance to orient ourselves on these trails, all new to us, a little bit, and it was easier to navigate our way with the leafless trees offering such long sight lines. By the time large floppy oak leaves obscure much of the view through the forest, we hope we’ll know the trails well enough to find out way without the extra visibility that the current starkness provides. Of course, when the leaves reach their thickest point, it will also be time for the mosquitoes to hatch, and we’ll probably avoid the woods until the days grow hotter and the yearly mosquito infestation subsides.

With the four feet of snow that covered the ground for much of this winter, spring was slow to arrive. But this weekend it came back: to the ground, to the forests, to the swamps and ponds in the form of ducks and geese paddling along. I’m still feeding the cows three bales of hay from the barn every morning, but they mouth the ground as if they’re practicing for grazing season or maybe hoping that doing so will hurry the growing process along. In another month, they’ll be grazing, and the month after that we’ll be doing the first hay-cutting of the year. One cow will deliver a calf sometime this spring, for the calf’s sake we’ll hope for a string of warm dry days when that time comes, though plenty of times calves arrive during chilly and rainy stretches and still manage to thrive.

The evening sky stays light well after seven o’clock. The sun rises well before the kids are up for school. The year is turning: from a remarkably snowy winter into what is finally turning out to be a mild and gentle spring. Cold days may still come, but we’re glad to have the beautiful days with which this week began, and we look forward to grass, leaves, flowers, and all the blessings of spring that still lie ahead.

Late late winter, spring approaching

I always call this time of year late winter, but last night I realized it’s latest winter: barely a week until the Spring Equinox.

Spring Equinox has such a pretty sound. All of those old-fashioned seasonal terms do – solstice, equinox, harvest moon – but yesterday it was particularly inspiring to think of spring starting in just another week. The past couple of days haven’t exactly been sunny and warm, but they have definitely held a hint of winter’s retreat. With temperatures above freezing all weekend, the snowbanks are rapidly melting away from the edge of the roadway, and mud is beginning to advance over much of the ground where snow has laid claim for the past three months.

The brook is rushing, not reaching alarming levels yet but starting to run high as it does every spring; with this much water swelling the banks, there’s no chance it will freeze again. And the cows seem to sense the change in season as well: even though a mix of snow and mud still cover the fields where in a few more months they’ll graze, they’ve been wandering over to the brook and out to the far pasture recently, whereas in the dead of winter they don’t leave the hard-packed dirt right in front of the hay barn. Even without the option of grazing, they seem curious to see what’s new in the woods and across the field, or maybe they’re just restless, but it’s inspiring to see them roaming beyond their usual tightly circumscribed winter route of barn to trough and back.

The kids exclaimed with delight when they spotted chipmunks this weekend, and the dog chased a flock of geese out of the field. I think she was as happy to be running fast over the rapidly diminishing snow cover as she was to think she could catch a fowl, which of course she can’t. But the geese and the chipmunks alike are a sign of spring encroaching.

And yesterday we turned the clocks forward, which gives us the first hint of summer’s long sunlit evenings. Summer still feels far away: the temperature is after all only in the 40’s, and with the depth of snow we had this winter, it could still be weeks before the last of it melts away. But indeed, it’s late late winter: spring begins next week. The earth, the sky, the animals all seem ready to transition into a new season, and I too welcome the softness in the air, the light in the sky, the muddy ground, the certainty that spring will soon arrive.

The lengthening days of late January

The lengthening minutes of daylight at this time of year seem like a small miracle, year after year.

Just as in mid-November I’m surprised anew every year at how early and how dark-gray the gathering dusk is, each year by late January I’m surprised to see a white-gold glow stay in the late-afternoon sky until five o’clock or later.

Why these things still surprise me is hard to say. Not only have I seen four decades of seasons; I’ve seen many of them from the same location. Yet still, the fact that the sky stays light later and later as January reaches toward February still feels like a daily blessing, a small touch of grace to end the afternoon.

Maybe it’s partly that a year like this with so much snow increases the brightness somewhat by reflecting it back. November tends to feel so dark not only because of the early sunsets but also because most years, including this past one, the predominant colors of November are gray and brown, with the ground turning dull in color, the leaves falling off the trees, and no snow yet. These past few weeks, not only has the light lasted longer but there are piles and piles of snow gleaming it back into the atmosphere.

At the church I used to attend in Framingham, the Womenspirit group celebrated a Winter Solstice reenactment every year, narrating the Wiccan legend of how the stag, representing light, must re-conquer the wolf, representing darkness, on the Winter Solstice to ensure that brightness will again prevail with the oncoming spring. The idea that early civilizations might not have been sure that the shortening days would eventually reverse course is fascinating to me, whether or not there’s any accuracy in it. I love the idea that you don’t really truly know, until you see the lengthening daylight of late January, whether summer will return or whether the days will just grow increasingly shorter and darker.

We’re definitely still in the midst of winter. The snowbanks are four feet high alongside our driveway, and more snow is forecast for midweek. It’s still only January – albeit the last day of January – and there’s little question, groundhogs notwithstanding, that we have plenty of time left to immerse ourselves in winter.

But at five o’clock I can’t help noticing that the sky is still bright. The stag has defeated the wolf yet again. Spring, then summer, will return.

Because time would not stop for me...

The subject line of the email from the cooking website caused my eyes to narrow as it flashed across my inbox yesterday afternoon. “Thanksgiving menu: it’s not too late to start planning!”

Of course it’s not too late, I muttered to myself irritably. It’s not even close to being too late! Thanksgiving is still eight days away.

But in truth, I know it’s also not too early. In fact, I myself should be planning my Thanksgiving menu. And on some level I am. Kind of, In the back of my mind. But not with the zeal I usually plan Thanksgiving.

And when a friend said today that she was already humming Christmas carols and basking in a Christmas mood, I told her I was still in an October mood and working hard to get to a Thanksgiving one. I’m doing everything I can to make time stand still, and yet strangely enough, it’s not working.

I just feel that this autumn is going by too fast. There’s no reason I feel that way this particular year, except that this autumn has allowed me to become so immersed in my writing and the kids’ new school year and some new article ideas and the publication of my book and getting to know the area around my parents’ new vacation home and a host of interests and activities to which fall lends itself. And all of that somehow seems to come to a screeching halt once the holidays approach. New school year? Try Thanksgiving vacation followed three weeks later by winter break, with report cards in between the two to remind you that the year is already exactly one-third over. One-third over? But I’m just getting used to the idea that Tim is in middle school. I don’t want to hear that seventh grade is already looming. I want it to be the first week of school for as long as possible.

But it’s not, of course. It’s seven days ‘til Thanksgiving. I love cooking Thanksgiving dinner. I’ve done it yearly since 1999 with only one exception. For that matter, I like cooking and menu-planning at any time of year. It’s not the domestic side of the situation that’s causing my agitation this year; it’s simply the chronological part. Winter holidays? Really? But I was so happy watching the leaves change.

It’s inevitable, and fall more than any other season seems to bring out the resistance in many of us to see time pass. So I’ll keep writing, keep finding time to walk in the woods, keep up everything that made this fall such a resonant time for me, and also nudge myself onward to the preliminary steps of holiday planning.

After all, no one says that has to mean six different pies on the Thanksgiving table or hours of Christmas shopping at the mall. Holiday season can mean whatever you want it to mean, including writing, reading and walks in the woods. But regardless of what it may mean to different people, simply as a function of the sun rising and setting, Thanksgiving will soon be here, and I have a menu to plan. Fortunately, as the email I received yesterday assured me, it is indeed not too late.

Unseasonable weather: A visit from summer

Generally, I like seasonable weather. It doesn’t matter the season; I just like weather that reflects the essence of the date on the calendar. I like heat waves in July, cool sunny days with bright blue skies in September, a chilly gray day with darkness falling early in November, a big snowstorm in January, a raw dampness in March, a soft warmth in the air in May.

But sometimes un-seasonable weather can be fun too. This week, for example, we’ve been having a taste of summer. It’s way too early to think this will last, but ever since Saturday we’ve been enjoying temperatures in the 70’s and unwavering sunshine. Yesterday the mercury rose into the mid-80’s, and it felt like the middle of July, not the beginning of April. Holly rode her bike after school. I went running in shorts and a T-shirt; Belle ran with me and waded into a stream to cool off as soon as I let her off the leash.

Unseasonable weather is like a visit from a friend you don’t see much. When it arrives, you immediately start remembering everything you like so much about it. On a day like yesterday, I remembered how great it is to go outside without piling on layers, and how pleasant it is to see the cows and sheep out grazing in the middle of the pasture rather than hovering next to the barn munching on dry hay. But it happens at other times of year too. An unseasonably chilly day in August makes me start thinking about all the benefits of back-to-school time even with school still a month away. A snowstorm in early December reminds me of how picturesque our setting is when the snow drifts high along the fences.

And being reminded of the upcoming season has practical benefits too. Temperatures in the 80’s yesterday inspired me to look over my summer wardrobe and think about what was worth keeping. A snowstorm in November gets everyone to the hardware store to buy shovels. Even a cold autumnal air front in the summer reminds me to buy the kids’ school supplies.

But also like a visiting guest, the unseasonable weather reminds us quickly not only of what we like about the season it hearkens to but also what we might not like so much about it. I never remember over the winter or early spring how much less energy I have in the hot weather; yesterday I was reminded generously, when I started feeling sluggish by late afternoon, the time I normally gear up to make dinner and start non-work related household tasks. Insects have started whirling in through the screens, too.

According to the forecast, our summer preview ends today and we’ll be back to early spring weather. We’ll miss summer, and we’ll look forward to seeing her again in another couple of months. In the meantime, we’ll get back to the cool windy days typical of April.

Last month during the flooding, when we had to park on the cul-de-sac behind us and walk through the woods to get to the cars because the driveway washed out, Tim commented, “it’s actually kind of fun going through the woods instead of the usual way,” and my father responded to him that any time things are different from the norm, it’s kind of fun. For kids I think this is particularly true. These days, something as trivial as an hour-long dentist appointment during the time of day that I normally write is enough to make me irritable, but I still remember how excited I was during a particularly massive blizzard in my childhood when we lost electricity for three days. Now when we lose electricity even for three hours, I get a little bit frustrated by the inconvenience, even though I know how intransigent that is of me, but back then, just living without lights on was a thrill.

And for Tim, walking through the woods to get to the car last month was a novelty. He’s right: exceptions to the regular routine are exciting. We had fun visiting with summer this week. It was great to get our bikes out and wear t-shirts and shorts. Soon enough the high heat of summer will return, only more in season. And we’ll be all the more ready for it, thanks to this week’s preview.

The cows are by the pond -- is that a sign of spring?

Throughout most of the winter, the cows stay close to the hay barn. Although they have free range over several acres of pastures and woods, they tend to huddle in the cold weather, moving little from the spot where I set their haybales every morning.

This doesn't seem surprising to me. I always assumed it was because they conserve energy and retain heat by staying put, and because they are not particularly comfortable slogging through snow drifts, not to mention the fact that when the fields are frozen or snow-covered, there’s nothing for them to graze on, so why bother to move away from the spot where they are fed, even once they’ve finished eating for the day?

So I was a little bit thrilled to look out the window yesterday afternoon and see that all six of them had crossed over two pastures to mill around by the pond, where they often graze in the summer. It made me think that although the temperatures rose no higher than the mid-30’s and wet snow fell for much of the morning, the cows might be detecting a tinge of spring.

I myself certainly wasn’t. When I went out running midmorning, I was wearing as many layers over my head, neck and torso as I do in January. But I was encouraged to think maybe the cows sensed something I didn’t. It is early March, after all. Spring should be on the way, at least fairly soon. Tim announced a few days ago that he’d seen Canada geese in the sky, which he considers the first sign of spring.

Still, if I woke from a six-month sleep today and didn’t have a calendar, I’m not sure I would have been able to identify this as early March. So I’m curious to know if the cows really were reacting to something in the air, or in their bovine limbic systems, or in their memories. Because not only is it reassuring to think that spring hovers somewhere close ahead, but it’s also appealing to imagine that animals feel changes in the seasons even if we don’t.

I’m a little ashamed of how out of touch with the weather I can be. It’s true that running a mile or more every single day puts me in closer and more constant proximity to the weather than I ever used to be. As I’ve written about before, the fact that I'm outside for at least those ten minutes every day means I always have some idea about how cold or warm it is and whether any precipitation is falling.

But at the same time, I check my computer every morning to see what the temperature is, and sometimes before I go out to feed the cows I check on the digital thermometer connected to our household heating system. Even though we have a traditional mercury thermometer on the porch, I somehow feel more assured if I see the numeric version on my computer screen or on the thermostat, which I realize makes no sense at all, especially as at that point I am seconds from going out into the weather myself.

Environmentalist Bill McKibben wrote in The Age of Missing Information about the peculiar and disturbing fact that in the 20th century, Americans developed the ability to turn on the Weather Channel and check the forecast anywhere in the world but have lost the ability to hold a finger in the air and determine which direction the wind is blowing from, not to mention determine from that information what kind of weather is likely on the way. Similarly, I consult the table in the newspaper every day to see what time sunrise and sunset is, having lost the ability my ancestors presumably had to keep track of the solar cycles by, well, looking at the sky.

So I’m left to wonder if the cows detect spring in the air – maybe even temperatures in the 40’s by this weekend? – or whether they were just tired of standing by the barn and chose to alleviate their cabin fever by taking a ramble over to the pond. And I feel sheepish, no pun intended, about the fact that I check my computer screen for the temperature and the newspaper for the forecast before I go outside, rather than feeling the breeze and smelling the air and watching the sky to obtain information. It all makes me wonder what else the cows might know that I don’t.

Or if maybe they don’t have any special animal sense at all of when spring is coming, but just saw a break in the precipitation and used it to go for a stroll to the pond, rather than worrying about when the next forecasted snowfall would begin.

Summer again for a little while

As so often happens in September, hot late-summer air and a tinge of humidity have returned, and I'm finding the weather very comforting. When I was a kid, I remember that the weather would often turn summer-like just after school began, and back then it bothered me. I wanted crisp, dry, fall air evocative of chilly afternoons and calling for cable knit sweaters with jeans, not more of the summer I was already tired of lingering on.

But today I welcome the hot sunshine after several days of fall-like briskness. It reminds me that summer is still hanging on a little longer, and we don't quite have to give up on the season yet. There's still time for more swimming, for running in a tank top and shorts rather than layers of fleece, for more ice cream that melts faster than we can eat it. It reminds me that so many things in life ebb and flow more than start and stop. With obvious exceptions, like life itself, many things do not have a full-stop ending: they build, diminish, but then sometimes return. Good things like old friendships (I'm off to visit a high school friend on Sunday with whom my almost 30-year relationship has definitely ebbed and flowed, rather than started and stopped), my love of biking (I did so much of it in my 20's, and so little when the kids were very young, and now we're gradually turning into a family that can bike together), my sense of security in many aspects of my life. Bad things both large and small like ongoing disagreements that build, then recede, then begin again; and bad habits, like disorganization or poor punctuality, that I conquer only to deal with all over again. And maintaining sensible eating habits, and dealing with seasonal allergies.

As much as there are some things I wish could just end and be done with, mostly I take comfort in knowing how many elements in my life are like the tide and the seasons: building, receding, cycling around again. And so too the hot weather: undeniably here throughout August, absent for the first few days of September, now back. With some obvious exceptions, life mostly makes circles rather than straight lines, and there's comfort to be found in knowing that this too -- whatever "this" may be -- will pass, but return, only to recede again, and then recur again.

Running Streak Day 755 - 1.7 miles in the afternoon, down to Clark Farm and then up to pick up Holly at school.