Right on time

First snow of the year, here, in very blustery flurries that don't stick except on the very tips of my porch plants and on fallen leaves.

This year is so seasonable, here, I'm not sure I know what to do with it. I was afraid we'd have another scorched Fall, but no, the autumn rains arrived just in time to make all the colors come out brilliantly. Even the oaks turned a really astonishing dark red, this year, and the sugar maples practically turned neon pink. And now it's all ragged yellows and rusts and washed out greens, leaves two thirds down, and the begonias and chrysanthemums hitting their marathoner's high right on time. And I got my new strings of little solar lights up on the porch just in time to have the proper, heart-deep satisfaction of light-in-the-darkness familiar to all dwellers in the "temperate" zones.

So happy new year to those celebrating it now. Me, I'm making my first pot of chili of the season.