Fall to winter

It seems to be that there's a particular time when the autumn becomes not so much like the last lingerings of summer but more like the harbinger of winter. This is how it feels to me now. I'm seeing the skeletons of trees (as well as skeletons hanging from trees); the brush of frost on the rooftops this morning.

Thus the seasons turn, and with the turning, my experience changes. That is, to me, the the intriguing and amazing thing. My experiencing of life is not only different as I age and access ever-wider horizons, but year by year, as the seasons metamorphose, they have an effect on me. I can only compare it to a kind of breathing that I welcome and am grateful for... yes, even to some extent, for the approach of winter.

I'm a pumpkin

Halloween season is upon us again, already. Like Christmastime, it seems to have stretched way beyond its previous bounds, in this case, 31st October. I have to confess that, even after fourteen years in North America, this is a tradition I still haven't managed to get into the spirit of. That's why I'm a pumpkin.

After last Halloween I resolved to go with it, but I'm afraid I'm dragging my feet. Which may be a good way to go. I could imitate a friend of mine who would don a dark cloak with a coal, hitch a makeshift scythe over his shoulder and go around muttering something ominous.

So, no costume party for me. No ghoulish decorations, although I once had visions of some kind of spider contraption that would swing down when someone rat-tatted at my door. Plus a few cobwebs.

Maybe I'll aim for the spider next year, and at least buy a pumpkin to test out my carving skills.

A luminous day

Maybe that rainbow was a sign and portent because yesterday I had a luminous day, a jewel of a day, the kind of day that makes mundane drudgery disappear and lifts you up into a higher sphere. (oh dear, sounds like the poetic muse is calling -- not today, dear, go away!)

First of all, I had the chance to spend golden hours with a friend who lives very far from me. And the autumn day was all golden too. Then we were surrounded by beauty, specifically, the wonders of one of the loveliest art galleries in the world. Experiencing the architecture, appreciating the way each vista had been conceived and carried out -- whew. And then there was the art itself. We ignored the stuff that shouted out or depressed and went for the simply and complicatedly beautiful.

When we walked out of our national gallery, I swear, both of us were floating at least a foot above the sidewalk.

The colours of the rainbow

I saw a rainbow yesterday. It's been a while for me, and there it appeared, so unexpectedly -- the full spectrum of colours, a band from the earth to about a third of the complete bow, shining and shimmering.

New Agers in the know talk about 'new' colours. But for me, I'm still exploring what's already been manifested. As I muse over what hues to paint my new walls, considering warm and cool and what effect the colours will have on me, hopefully I'll be inspired by what I saw. Certainly, I found the sight uplifting, and was grateful for that surprising and amazing gift.

And as I travelled further and changed direction, I saw the last third, touching the earth.

Now all that's missing for me is the bit in the middle, the third that spans the skies.

The Attitude Switch

Where is it?

So, our glorious Indian summer of last week has given way to grey skies and rain.

Oh misery me. Michaelmas, I find, is often a challenging season of the year. Certain happenings in my life just now make it tempting to let myself slide down into the slough of despond. How to click that attitude switch? Two strategies occurred to me.

Firstly, to tell myself, "Pull yourself together!" Good advice, actually, when our souls tend to split into the emotional, the intellectual and the what we actually, physically do and want to do. If I'm together, I'm okay. Yes, a pep talk can be effective.

Then I started to think about dark -- swamping, all-encompassing darkness and its seeming victory over the light. Staring at the flame of my small beeswax candle I realized that even the tiniest source of light gives us the possibility of being able to see a great deal, and can illumine even the most sombre cave. And thus our spirits are lifted.

Holiday

Here we go, into the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend. To me it's wonderful that it's celebrated as a harvest festival, and I'm always moved by the efforts made towards this, like suitable wreaths of golden leaves on front doors, sheaves of dried wheat stalks decorating the outdoor patio of a neighbourhood bar and grill. Nice.

But the butterfly wanted to write about something else.

There are only a couple of blogs that I read regularly, probably because I haven't found, or searched for, other compatible ones. But Michelle Rowen always gives me a kick. I love the way she expresses herself. She's away on 'vacay' at the moment, which got me thinking... We used to shorten words like 'vacation' into one syllable i.e. 'vac'. 'Fabulous' became 'fab' instead of the current 'fabu'. Interesting eh? I wonder why we used to go for one syllable and now we like two??

I have no theories, just the question today.

Have time?

"It only takes a few minutes."

How often have you heard or read that statement, usually in connection with something that 'should' be done? For me the one that stands out from the mists of memory was: "It only takes a few minutes, last thing at night, to wash your nylon stockings and hang them to dry for the morning."

!

And so our time incrementally and gradually gets filled up, till we nearly always feel pressed. At least I do. It's a habit now. But why should I buy into this?

Strolling with the little person, we stopped to watch a white butterfly flitting here and there; and I realized... yes, I do have time. All I have to do is take it.