Bursts of rain this evening after the setting sun painted the east meadow and north wooded boundary with shades of bronze and gold, outlining the nearly leafless trees against a sky that shifted quickly from blue-with-clouds to brooding shades of steely grey and pewter.
We are experiencing that yearly transition between autumn and the official onset of winter, with a bit less than a month before the December solstice signals the incremental return of daylight.
Morning hours have been wrapped in clinging fog, damp and chilly.
The sun breaks through by noon some days, wobbling in and out from behind scudding clouds, spreading shafts of pale light across our wood floors.
Sheets pegged on the back porch lines are brought in still damp, a faint scent of wet leaves and drifting wood smoke caught in their folds as I bundle them into the dryer.
The red leaves of burning bush have been whipped away by the rain and wind; under-story beeches along the ravines and a few oaks still wear battered and faded leaves.
This morning the tall fog-wreathed hickory at the bottom of the sloping back lawn was barely visible.
If I position my head just so on my pillow the top of the tree is perfectly framed in the center pane of my west window, fore-shortened by the lay of the land below the house.
The curtain of fog shifted and I watched a grey squirrel float from branch to branch, skitter down the trunk, scamper back up to swing on a limb. The ground there is littered with both hickory nuts and acorns. The squirrels have been busy gathering the nuts and shoving them into hastily scooped depressions in the mossy turf. Walking there, the ground is spongy, perhaps tunneled with burrows and nut stores.
At 4 p.m. I stepped into my boots, pulled on a jacket and headed to the mailbox. Where the gravel lane bends around the edge of our neighbor's pasture two kildeers scuttled before me, not calling noisily as they do in nesting season, just trundling silently under the fence, disappearing into the damp grass.
Back at the house I dumped the 'junk' mail on the table, shed my too warm jacket, picked up my old point and shoot camera.
I walked twice around the loop paths, came into the house thinking I should start supper, but was drawn outside in the strange shifting light and shadows to walk the path again.
Trees along the north ravine edge.
Looking toward the house, gardens, and barn, the lane in front of me darkly shadowed.
A closer shot of the sun-gilded tree line.
Winter wheat sown 5th November as cover crop on garden.
The winter wheat emerged more slowly in the ruts made by the tractor wheels.
Skyline near the kitchen scrap dump.
Sun sliding behind trees toward the southwest.
The edge of darkness.
Sharing with you, a yellow pansy raising her head after the rain.
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