A week and a half ago, the season's first snow arrived. A shock to the system, but not unexpected, winter often arriving early in this green, lovely corner of the world.
This week, the weather gods decided to play nice, dealing out several days of mild, user-friendly conditions. Nights above freezing, afternoons up in the '60's. Fine weather for working outside, which I did, though not as much as I might have, because along with the stretch of kinder weather came an unexpected spell of laziness, leading me to act vaguely like I was doing productive things while accomplishing next to nothing.
I blame it on company that arrived the Friday evening of last weekend, leading to far too much conversation around the dining table for the next 36 hours, chat accompanied by excessive food production and consumption. (Which, I swear, had no effect on my svelte, adorable bod.) Kind of set a tone. (It's good to have someone to blame things on.)
But laziness, now that I think about it, is not the appropriate word. Because if I can muster up focus and interest, I can get as productive and industrious as... a human who is... all righteously productive. And industrious. So no, it's not the lazy thing. It's more along the lines of... not being exactly what might be called ecstatic every minute of every day. But I'm not digging into that. Because apart from the moments when I'm not exactly what might be termed blissful, I am often strangely serene.
Part of the reason for that serenity: ignoring to a very successful degree everything related to the recent political hooha. Yes, the result -- of the presidential race, anyway -- produced a wave of joy from just about every single living being on this planet of ours (except maybe Sarah Palin. and the more bigoted and emotionally pinched of those in the political spectrum's rightward reaches). But prior to that magical wave of happiness? Many months of ugly behavior and obnoxious television ads. All of which I'm happy to say I mostly missed.
So. Promoting serenity. Yee-ha!
Meanwhile, that mild, sweet weather has given way to cold, gray, damp. The clocks changed two weekends ago, suddenly darkness is falling early in this northern locale. The spectrum of colors in the local countryside continues narrowing down, on gray days lights have to be turned on around 3:30, 4 o'clock.
But there is something I do like about the turning inward of this time of year, the quieting down -- life takes on a more meditative quality, existence becomes simpler (holiday wackiness aside*). And sometimes on these gray, cold days, gaps open up in the clouds, sunlight slips through. A quiet kind of light with a special luminosity, stretching into the living space, bringing surfaces it touches to glowing life. For a short while anyway -- fading with time, giving way to shadows, darkness, the long night.
Just one more moment in the seasons' constant flow. Here briefly before melting away, becoming something else.
*Halloween evening -- me passing quickly through a local supermarket, picking up a few items. I pass one employee busy replacing a spooky holiday display with boxes of big candy canes. The body, so to speak, was not only still warm, it was still alive, several hours away from expiring. And they were already dragging it out the door, propping up another body in its place, the new one all red, white and stripey. The commercial sector: fickle, mercenary, and making no bones about it.
España, te echo de menos
rws 10:27 PM [+]
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