Tag Archives: Autumn
Drinking in the surroundings
“I was drinking in the surroundings: air so crisp you could snap it with your fingers and greens in every lush shade imaginable offset by autumnal flashes of red and yellow.” ― Wendy Delsol I had never heard of Wendy Delsol until I came across this quote, but she described exactly what I was doing the …
Bright and intense and beautiful
“Fall colors are funny. They’re so bright and intense and beautiful. It’s like nature is trying to fill you up with color, to saturate you so you can stockpile it before winter turns everything muted and dreary.” ― Siobhan Vivian That’s what I do on my walks; stockpile the colors and images and cool, smoke-scented …
Wild with leaves
“Listen! The wind is rising, and the air is wild with leaves, We have had our summer evenings, now for October eves!” ― Humbert Wolfe The photo above was taken just a few months after we moved to Virginia, having lived in northern California for the past five years. I was almost unbearably homesick for …
Autumnal sunshine
“I cannot endure to waste anything so precious as autumnal sunshine by staying in the house.” — Nathaniel Hawthorne “In autumn, don’t go to jewelers to see gold; go to the parks!” — Mehmet Murat ildan As our President would say, let me be clear. Yesterday’s post was about rainy weather. On a gloriously bright fall day, we simply MUST find …
What the world gives you
“Use what you have, use what the world gives you. Use the first day of fall: bright flame before winter’s deadness; harvest; orange, gold, amber; cool nights and the smell of fire. Our tree-lined streets are set ablaze, our kitchens filled with the smells of nostalgia: apples bubbling into sauce, roasting squash, cinnamon, nutmeg, cider, …
Such a beautiful day
“I cried at first…..and then, it was such a beautiful day, that I forgot to be unhappy.” — Frances Noyes Hart Have you ever walked outside in a gloomy mood, and been overtaken by the sheer beauty of the day? It’s happened to me many times, and the feeling of relief and joy that floods …
A harmony in autumn
“There is a harmony in autumn, and a luster in its sky, which through the summer is not heard or seen, as if it could not be, as if it had not been!” — Percy Bysshe Shelley If I was absolutely forced to choose a favorite season, it would be autumn. Even its name is more …
In the fall
“Don’t you love New York in the fall? It makes me want to buy school supplies. I would send you a bouquet of newly sharpened pencils if I knew your name and address.” ― Nora Ephron I love fall because it is connected with my happiest memories of childhood. In particular, the onset of cooler …
Its own measure
“A journey implies a destination, so many miles to be consumed, while a walk is its own measure, complete at every point along the way. There are things we will never see, unless we walk to them.” – Thomas A. Clark On the last Sunday of October, it was an amazing 80 degrees outside at …
Any wonderful unexpected thing
“After the keen still days of September, the October sun filled the world with mellow warmth…The maple tree in front of the doorstep burned like a gigantic red torch. The oaks along the roadway glowed yellow and bronze. The fields stretched like a carpet of jewels, emerald and topaz and garnet. Everywhere she walked the …
But you knew
“You expected to be sad in the fall. Part of you died each year when the leaves fell from the trees and their branches were bare against the wind and the cold, wintery light. But you knew there would always be the spring, as you knew the river would flow again after it was frozen.”― …
The grand finale
“Fall has always been my favorite season. The time when everything bursts with its last beauty, as if nature had been saving up all year for the grand finale.”— Lauren Destefano The weather here is finally cooling off enough that we are getting some splendid fall color, though it was still over 70 degrees several …
Packed up, but still
“Now the long freight of autumn goes smoking out of the land. My possibles are all packed up, but still I do not leave…” —Thomas McGrath Many years ago, when the movie Dances with Wolves came out, there was a sort of fad of people thinking up American Indian names for themselves that were …
As it always does
“But when fall comes, kicking summer out…as it always does one day sometime after the midpoint of September, it stays awhile like an old friend that you have missed…” — Stephen King As I write this, Hurricane Florence is forecast to strike the Virginia and North Carolina coasts in a few days, and our beloved …
Permanence and change
“October is a symphony of permanence and change.” ― B. W. Overstreet It’s comforting that some things remain the same. As the seasons remind us, there is a reassuring pattern in nature that helps us stay on track when everything around us seems to be in meltdown. The changes in my personal world, and in the …
My sentiments
Besides the Autumn poets sing A few prosaic days A little this side of the snow And that side of the Haze — . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Perhaps a squirrel may remain — My sentiments to share — Grant me, Oh Lord, a sunny …
A mosaic
“Winter is an etching, spring a watercolor, summer an oil painting and autumn a mosaic of them all.” —Stanley Horowitz This quote captures the appeal of the year-end visual landscape, as dark lines edge and define the deepening colors, and the waning sunlight washes over everything with the impressionism of a watercolor. Autumn is a …
Love at the board, 2016
Dear readers, this post from Thanksgiving last year still says it better than I could say it today. It’s a sort of visit from the Posts of Thanksgiving Past, to borrow a phrase from Dickens. At the time I wrote this, I honestly never expected that it would be our last Thanksgiving with Jeff. Despite the …
September Days
…September days are here, With summer’s best of weather, And autumn’s best of cheer. — Helen Hunt Jackson Don’t you just love this time of year, when the weather begins to cool down just enough to be refreshing, and that crisp hint of autumn is in the air? Jeff and I …
Love at the board
For hearts that are kindly, with virtue and peace, and not seeking blindly a hoard to increase; for those who are grieving o’er life’s sordid plan; for souls still believing in heaven and man; for homes that are lowly with love at the board; for things that are holy, I thank thee, O Lord! — Walt …
A fine autumnal day
“It was, as I have said, a fine autumnal day; the sky was clear and serene, and nature wore that rich and golden livery which we always associate with the idea of abundance. The forests had put on their sober brown and yellow, while some trees of the tenderer kind had been nipped by the frosts …
A festival season
Just after the death of the flowers, And before they are buried in snow, There comes a festival season, When nature is all aglow— Aglow with a mystical splendour That rivals the brightness of spring, Aglow with a beauty more tender Than aught which fair summer could bring…. (attributed to Emeline B. Smith, about whom …
A riot to the senses
“October proved a riot a riot to the senses and climaxed those giddy last weeks before Halloween.” ― Keith Donohue Blogs are a wonderful way to connect to people all over the world, and today’s photo is one example of the fun that can result. As I write this, we aren’t yet having riots of color …
In the slanted light
All the feathery grasses shine in the slanted light. It’s time to bring in the lawn chairs and wind chimes, time to draw the drapes against the wind, time to hunker down. Summer’s fruits are preserved in syrup, but nothing can stopper time. — from the poem “And Now it’s October” by Barbara Crooker Just when we …
Defeat Despair 