Quotes from the Classics: November
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.
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.
Bare trees and Light by Johannes Plenio
So what Love is there to be found in November? I wanted to push myself, as I wrote this post, to feel into this time of year and see what it had to teach me. What happens when I accept that which I do not like? Certainly, I could distract myself with preparing for Black Friday sales, but what happens when I surrender? What happens when I give the worries to the wind, and accept the invitation to rest? What happens when I let go of what I can’t control and trust that what I need, what is mine, will come back to me, a truth the naked trees already seem to possess? Am I so graceful as they?
Definitively no, but I am learning. I am learning that when I accept, space is created where there was only resistance. And when there is space, all kinds of magic can happen. I can see with new eyes, find the Light, and be so very grateful for it precisely because it was hard to find. Inspired now, I can be joyful, I can create, I can be the Light. We surrender because we must, because we will lose ourselves if we don’t. We let go and breathe, dream, slow, pray. And then we offer gratitude for the gift of life, knowing we’ve witnessed magic and more, that we are the magicians. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. Enjoy these quotes that capture the spirit of November.
A brief but important note: For many years, I’ve been conflicted about our American Thanksgiving tradition. I think it is a beautiful time to elevate gratitude and to spend time with my dear family. AND, I’m not oblivious as to its origins. I have faced this conflict with other traditions and my personal approach is to be honest about it, to work to make beauty of it, and to make it meaningful to me, and in that way, to reclaim it. My daughters and I, with humility and great respect, venture to learn about Native American culture, especially during November. This year, I’m sharing passages from Braiding Sweetgrass - not only a Love letter to the Earth but also a gorgeous glimpse into Native American culture, and possibly my favorite book. I do not claim to know all or even some, and I offer this, not to preach, but maybe to help us both remember all we share. Do with it what you will.
“The leaves believe such letting go is love, such love is faith, such faith is grace, such grace is God. I agree with the leaves.”
“A wind has blown the rain away and blown the sky away and all the leaves away, and the trees stand. I think I, too, have known autumn too long. ”
“No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds, November!”
“The thinnest yellow light of November is more warming and exhilarating than any wine they tell of. The mite which November contributes becomes equal in value to the bounty of July.”
“But there is always a November space after the leaves have fallen when she felt it was almost indecent to intrude on the woods...for their glory terrestrial had departed and their glory celestial of spirit and purity and whiteness had not yet come upon them.”
“There is a calmness to a life lived in gratitude, a quiet joy.”
“In November, the earth is growing quiet. It is making its bed, a winter bed for flowers and small creatures.”
“In November, the smell of food is different. It is an orange smell. A squash and pumpkin smell. It tastes like cinnamon and can fill up a house in the morning, can pull everyone from bed in a fog.”
“Peering from some high window, at the gold of November sunset and feeling that if day has to become night, this is a beautiful way.”
“Autumn is the season to find contentment at home by paying attention to what we already have.”
“There comes a time when people get tired of being pushed out of the glittering sunlight of life’s July and left standing amid the piercing chill of an alpine November.”
Love in all things,
April Eileen
Quotes from the Classics: October
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!
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!
If you tune in right now, the Earth is unearthing herself. The cooling air has less moisture, less vapor, and fewer clouds, the sun casting its final few warm rays from a seat of brilliant blue. Animals scurry about in pursuit of basic food and shelter, the essential becoming apparent. The leaves remove their cloaks of green and the trees now don their favorite colors. There is enough light, seeming to shine on rather than through things, to reveal all as it is for just a moment before everything pares back to pure essence. The veil is thin, as those now honoring ancestors and remembering they are part of a story much larger than themselves, would share. Everything is honest. Everything is gorgeous. And there is perspective to be had.
Fall trees by Pixabay
Who are we? Who are we really? What is true? So true that it puts what is not in relief? And what is not ours, not us? Sense yourself and hold on devotedly, cut what’s misaligned, and let it fall away in the cool autumn breeze. I believe the season will support it. Now is the time to see we are not our flaws or our failures or the 1,001 iterations of fear we harbor (the psychologically systemic kind, not the running from lions kind). Rather, we are the beautiful humans having them, able to move toward the Light because of them, ever becoming more of who we are meant to be. And isn’t that really the goal? We are colors of Love, the hurts healed by our brilliance, the pain soothed by our beauty, the world painted with more peace. The trees have already revealed their favorite colors? What’s yours?
Check out these quotes from the classics that speak to all things October. Enjoy!
“Every leaf speaks bliss to me
Fluttering from the autumn tree.”
“It’s the first day of autumn! A time of hot chocolatey mornings, and toasty marshmallow evenings, and, best of all, leaping into leaves!”
“The day becomes more solemn and serene
When noon is past; there is a harmony
In autumn, and a lustre in its sky,
Which through the summer is not heard or seen,
As if it could not be, as if it had not been!”
“Is not this a true autumn day? Just the still melancholy that I love - that makes life and nature harmonise... Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the Earth seeking the successive autumns.”
“Only lovers
see the fall
a signal end to endings
a gruffish gesture alerting
those who will not be alarmed
that we begin to stop
in order to begin
again.”
“There is no season when such pleasant and sunny spots may be lighted on, and produce so pleasant an effect on the feelings, as now in October”
“I just want to live in a world of mountains, coffee, campfires, cabins and golden trees, and run around with a camera and notebook, learning the inner workings go everything real.”
Love in all things,
April Eileen
P.S. Alright, I just really dig Victoria Erickson and her absolutely beautiful writing. Can we say modern classic?
Quotes from the Classics: September
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.
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 do.
From the outset, my lovely daughter and I failed to see eye to eye on one important concept. I was madly in Love with sleeping (still am) and she was tolerant, at best (still is). To her, sleep was a necessary part of the human experience, sure, but certainly not something one would purposely go out of their way to do. Sleep was something that just kind of fell upon you when you weren’t paying attention, and in particularly interesting situations, something to be fought against at every turn lest you be caught unawares, fall victim, and MISS something. And when you’re 2 or 3, everything is an interesting situation.
My sweet child decided the best way to retain all the things she’d learned during the day would be to do a systematic review at bedtime…out loud…for hours. If she wasn’t otherwise fighting nap time, she believed dozing for 5 minutes in the car was perfectly sufficient. If she woke up in the morning, going back to sleep wasn’t an option, at least for a few hours. I spent years a haggard shell of a woman and I’m ashamed to admit it, but I was often angry with her. Every once in a while, though, a particularly brilliant mom moment helped me to redeem myself.
Sunrise and tall grass by Rose Erkul
I had such a moment one ridiculously early morning when I woke to find big, blinking, brown eyes staring at me. After having sung songs, rubbed and soothed, brewed tea, coaxed and cajoled, all to no avail, I packed my little one up, drove to the lake, and watched wonder fill her face as color and light filled the clear September sky. Our tradition had begun.
Since then, the places have changed, and we’ve even added another member to our little crew, but the tradition remains, the September sun rising so late in the morning as to not thwart the sleep my eldest does get these days. Our latest location is at the top of a very high hill that requires us to trek across a field and up 116 steps. When we first found it, my youngest (who Loves to sleep, thank heaven) was about the same age as her sister. Each year about halfway across the field, she would inevitably yell, “Mommy, I can’t make it.” I’d have to pick her up and race across dewy grass and up a concrete corridor to the beat the sun! We always made it, though my chest felt like it was going to cave in each time. I watched a new little face fill with the same amazement my oldest and I had come to know, and the three of us would face the coming of a new day together.
Recently my littlest has managed to make the journey without help, and there is a pang of sadness. I know they’re growing up and I will have to let them go, as the trees let their leaves go each Fall. I also know nothing real is ever really gone. I know that while seasons change and years pass, relationships woven with September sunrises and lots of Love, will remain.
Check out these quotes that capture the specialness of September:
“All the months are crude experiments, out of which the perfect September is made.”
“Happily we bask in this warm September sun, which illuminates all creatures…”
“Comfort me with apples. ”
“I’ll tell you how the Sun rose -
A Ribbon at a time -
The Steeples swam in Amethyst -
The news, like Squirrels, ran - ”
“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!”
“Is not this a true autumn day? Just the still melancholy that I love — that makes life and nature harmonize. ”
“The first breath of autumn was in the air, a prodigal feeling, a feeling of wanting, taking, and keeping before it is too late.”
Love in all things,
April Eileen