A Bit Bookish

Happy Holidays to you and welcome, Winter! ‘Tis the season of cozy so raise a cup of hot cocoa to sweaters, crackling fires, warm blankets, and snuggles with the ones you Love most. Whatever your traditions and celebrations, I hope your season is full of Love and Light and all that is truly important. Check out the quotes below for inspiration as you navigate seasonal endings and the inevitable beginnings they bring.

November does not readily lend itself to lines of poetry. Gone are the blue skies and brisk mornings of September and October. There is little hope of one of those unseasonably warm days that surprise and delight everyone. It is not quite…not quite the time of twinkling snow or hot chocolate or fires in the fireplace, not quite the season of holiday cheer (after all, by the time families gather around a turkey and Christmas music is played in earnest, November is all but over), and not quite the coming of new year resolutions. It is even too early to wait for it to be beautiful again. The Light has passed, the skies are grey, and we find ourselves in a strange liminal space of the desolate, the dark, the cold drizzles, the dreariness, with which we must sit. And what is there to say about that? It’s ugly, or so it seems, and most of us have just resigned ourselves to simply wishing it were something else.

Ohio is an autumn postcard, a veritable cliché of colored leaves, pumpkin patches, and cinnamon donuts with warm apple cider. There is a chill in the air that makes a hoodie extra special, whether it be worn on a hayride, through a corn maze, or shielding against intermittent snow flurries, depending on the year. Welcome, October!

When my oldest baby was an actual baby - no more than 2 or 3 years old - we began a tradition of watching September sunrises. This didn’t happen as it would in the movies. It was not the result of arduous pre-planning or creative brainstorming. It spawned from pure chaos, like the best ideas often are.

Hello, August! Mid-to-late summer has a distinctly different feel than the first half of the season. As with everything, I’m finding I have to pay close attention to get in on the magic. On the surface, things are moving. Gardens are full and neighbors are frantically exchanging zucchinis and tomatoes from plants they’ve nurtured, plants that have now gone bonkers as a result. The bounty of fresh food, perfumed with summer’s carefree essence, initiates front porch conversations and handwritten thank you cards. Joy and exuberance emanate like the sparks of nearby bonfires glittering in the open night.

Fireworks and watermelon and pool parties…oh, my! Summer is here and in full sweltering effect if you’re in the Northern Hemisphere! My family and I usually find ourselves near the Lake-Oceans of Michigan or Wisconsin around the 4th of July, basking in the majesty and splendor of what seems to be a well-kept secret outside the Midwest. Visiting has become a a bit of an accidental tradition, in that somehow, year after year and without plan, we end up running down sand dunes, munching fresh farmer’s market cherries, delighting in monarch butterflies, roasting marshmallows over blazing bonfires, stargazing, or watching sunsets and moonrises over the water. I’m a July baby and these visits, full of fireworks and festive displays celebrating our country, have become a sort of unofficial birthday party for me too.

Happy Solstice, everyone! We’re really in the swing of it now! If you’re in the northern hemisphere, you know all the people are doing all the things. Air conditioners are running full speed even as we venture out to birthday parties, barbecues, and lakeside picnics. It can be so fun and it can also be uber exhausting if we don't pace ourselves. If you’re like me, you can benefit greatly from saying yes to things that light you up AND the most beautiful no you can muster to things that don’t. See my May post for more on that. I don’t always get it right but when I come close, I’m able to enjoy this season of full bloom so much better!

We are in full swing, folks! The showers did in fact bring flowers and maybe some frenzy too. May showcases full-on evidence that we are alive - the bustle, the to and fro, the busy. There are coffee dates to be had, lighter clothes to pull out of storage, and plenty of weeds to pull and while I agree wholeheartedly with Wayne Dyer - “the difference between a flower and a weed is a judgment,” - I still spent three hours last week searching for lettuce and carrot sprouts.

We’re here, we’re alive, we’re excited AND we’re down on the ground, tending, sometimes taxed, and day-to-daying too. If you’re like me (the most introvertive extrovert any of you know), you couldn’t be more pleased about the sunshine and you might also be secretly dreading that dinner party or missing those quiet evenings of journaling and reflection. What a conundrum.

It’s Spring at last! Yet April necessitates patience and patience, by definition, is hard. Otherwise it would just be waiting. April provides an even more tangible promise of euphoria, while simultaneously requiring us to sit a while longer in transition. Our expectations begin to get the better of us. The snow has given way - well, usually (I’m looking at you Ohio) - but to what? There are days of warmth and sunshine to be sure, but very often there is rain and even a blustery reminder of the winter past. I hurry to my community garden plot to water my plants and keep them from burning up in near 90 degree weather, only to hurry back two days later to cover them and protect them from possible frost. “Gah!,” I project in my being. “Just hurry up and get there…arrive already,” my essence seems to say. But there are gifts here, in this space and time of year, to ease the hearts of even the most impatient.

I often hurry March in my desire to get to Spring, overlooking the quiet beauty and rising energy of this month. It is a month of transition, of endings and new beginnings. It holds both melancholy and anticipation and suspends them together in wonder. It’s gifts come slowly in whispers at first and then all at once in celebratory cheers. It is a time of nuance and subtlety, begging us to tune-in and be surprised and delighted. I love how these writers capture the essence of this special moment in the year. Enjoy!