Alexandersmap

    Category: seasons

    • These Bare November Days

      My sorrow, when she’s here with me,
      Thinks these dark days of autumn rain
      Are beautiful as days can be;
      She loves the bare, the withered tree;
      She walks the sodden pasture lane.

      Her pleasure will not let me stay.
      She talks and I am fain to list:
      She’s glad the birds are gone away,
      She’s glad her simple worsted grey
      Is silver now with clinging mist.

      The desolate, deserted trees,
      The faded earth, the heavy sky,
      The beauties she so truly sees,
      She thinks I have no eye for these,
      And vexes me for reason why.

      Not yesterday I learned to know
      The love of bare November days
      Before the coming of the snow,
      But it were vain to tell her so,
      And they are better for her praise.
      — Robert Frost, My November Guest

      Stick season in New Hampshire. Sleet and rain greet me as I bring the pup out for her morning relief. These are darker days, surely, for the days are shorter than they were yesterday and the day before. The earth turns a cold shoulder on the warmth of the sun, and we are left to work with the light that’s left for us.

      I don’t struggle with seasonal depression, but I certainly understand where it comes from. The trick is to get outdoors anyway and greet the day no matter how dismal her response or cold her shoulder. We navigate through our days, rain or shine. That’s not naive optimism, it’s awareness of the conditions around and within. Dress accordingly.

      Frost was a New Hampshire resident, just up the road a bit from where I call home. He lived through his own share of dark Novembers and naked trees. He turned his days into poetry. I wonder sometimes, especially on cold, wet and dark November mornings, what are we doing with our own?

      As the sleet accumulated on the walk, the pup delighted in this new world of snow cone bliss. She ran about, licking up this unexpected abundance of icy treats, tail wagging furiously in her excitement at this previously unimagined experience. When you treat whatever the universe throws at you with such wonder, how can you do anything but love these bare November days?

    • Letting Go

      To live in this world
      you must be able
      to do three things:
      to love what is mortal;
      to hold it
      against your bones knowing
      your own life depends on it;
      and, when the time comes to let it go,
      to let it go.
      — Mary Oliver, In Blackwater Woods

      This is the time of year when the leaves release from the trees and drift in the breeze in waves, becoming a force of nature in their return to the earth. It’s easy to see them as alive—characters in their freedom from the branches that once held them. The tree lets them go in their time, and releases their burden that they may survive another winter season.

      Humans hold on to their own things. Homes full of stuff, people who sap our vitality, positions of honor that sap our soul. Why do we hold so tightly to things that, deep down, we know must be released?

      Identity. We begin to believe that we are that person with that job, or the one who raises those children. For awhile we may be the soccer parent or the blogger, the hiker or sailor or the life of the party. Perhaps even that crazy uncle who says the most ridiculous things and prods nieces and nephews out of their shells. Identity is a tricky thing indeed. We are grounded in it, and let it drive our every decision.

      Human beings always cling to things.
      Practice begins when you stop clinging.
      — Awa Kenzo, Zen Bow, Zen Arrow

      Those trees offer a lesson, don’t they? The tree is rooted in place, reaching for the sky, making the most of whatever season it happens to be in. The leaves are not the tree, but a part of it, nurtured in one season and released in another. Everything has its time. No, the leaves aren’t the tree at all, simply a part of it. It’s the roots that matter far more for the tree to survive.

      What are we rooted in? What do we hold on to far longer than we should? What do we need to let go of to survive another winter and thrive when the season changes in our favor? When the time comes, let go.

    • Halloween Characters

      Another Halloween is upon us. Frightening how quickly the time flies, isn’t it? How quickly we move through our days. The only proper way to honor that is to make this one special.

      Ah, but there’s work to do. People to talk to and things scheduled. But at least we can get a glimpse of adventure in, yes? What is that one thing that will make today memorable—to set it apart from last Tuesday or next Thursday? Every day doesn’t have to be an exclamation point in a long life, but it ought to be the kind of day worthy of the precious investment you’ve made in it.

      To be fair, I can’t remember most anything about any specific Halloween. I remember wearing ridiculous costumes to a few parties, I remember the years when packs of kids would trick or treat through the neighborhood. And I’ve grown familiar with the lean years, when all the kids in the neighborhood grew up and moved away, including my own. These days, we’re lucky to get eight or ten kids at the door for candy. What are we to do with all that candy if the kids don’t come? Hmm.

      If Halloween reminds of us anything, it’s that we are all playing characters in the moment. We can always put on another costume and be someone else for the next party. We can be a superhero or a bum, a princess or a witch, a king or a jester. Really, anything goes if we want to play the part. So why not the rest of the year? What exactly are we doing with our character development anyway? Isn’t it time to be more creative and fun with our choices?

      The thing is, we can dwell on time flying by or we can simply live each day as if it were our last. One day we’ll be right. But let’s hope for a long future, shall we? Full of many more trick or treaters, and the occasional sweet treat. Maybe even a character we’ve been dreaming of being for too many unfulfilled days. Decide what to be and go be it. That’s the trick to a fulfilling life.

      Happy Halloween.

    • Place and Identity

      Given this day,
      Right now
      To ponder;
      Yesterday will not return,
      Who knows about tomorrow?
      — Awa Kenzo, Zen Bow, Zen Arrow

      Yesterday, in one of those only in New England moments, I cleared the lawn of leaves, mowed the lawn neatly halfway across, and in a glance up and behind me witnessed thousands of leaves raining down at once, literally released before my eyes and twirling down onto the lawn that was pristine moments before. I laughed out loud, shook my head and kept mowing the part of the lawn I hadn’t finished yet. Everyone here knows that clearing fallen leaves is a process. The only folks who clear once are those who wait until December, when the risk of early snow or wet leaves frozen to the grass could well be your ruin.

      I used to pay someone to do fall cleanup. His team did a great job too, but I stopped using him when I started mowing my own lawn. This wasn’t an act of frugality, it was an attempt to get back in touch with the plot of land I call home. For I’d completely lost touch with the place and felt the absence profoundly. No such problem now—I’ve become reacquainted with the land. Perhaps overly familiar at times.

      I’m an avid traveller and aspire to see more of this world, but in each place I’m but another soul passing through, taking some photos to remember the place by and (sometimes) writing about it in this blog. Each day spent in the yard or garden is a day not spent doing something appealing elsewhere. And yet the yard and garden have their own appeal.

      The question is, where do we spend our days? Right now is all we have, so why spend it maintaining a yard instead of hiking a mountain or taking a long walk on the beach on a warm October day? Because this is the stuff of life too. I’m just another soul passing through this plot of land too. But I’m also its custodian. The trees thrive on my watch—who’s to say whether they’ll survive the whims of the next homeowner less inclined to spend their Saturdays clearing leaves?

      Yesterday will not return. Who knows about tomorrow? All we can do is make the most of our today, in whatever way adds meaning to our moments. Even if we have to repeat it all again next weekend. Working to maintain the land honors both place and identity. We learn that it’s not just the land that is maintained in our ritual of labor.

    • The Cover of October Skies

      Well, it’s a marvelous night for a moondance
      With the stars up above in your eyes
      A fantabulous night to make romance
      ‘Neath the cover of October skies
      And all the leaves on the trees are falling
      To the sound of the breezes that blow
      You know I’m tryin’ to please to the calling
      Of your heartstrings that play soft and low
      You know the night’s magic seems to whisper and hush
      You know the soft moonlight seems to shine in your blush
      Can I just have one more moondance with you, my love?
      — Van Morrison, Moondance

      It’s no coincidence that we are drawn outdoors in October. In New Hampshire, the foliage is strikingly beautiful on some trees this year, while others have barely begun to turn. Strange what a year of near-constant rain can do to a tree’s inclination to dress up for the party. But the show must go on nonetheless, stragglers will inevitably catch up in their time. For it’s all about the shrinking days now. If leaves are the flowers of autumn, then they’re more like the blossoms of a fruit tree, announcing their time in the sun is over with a brilliant dance in the breeze on their return to the earth. Don’t we owe it to them to bear witness?

      I dwell in such things. I have a photographers eye and a philosopher’s mind, and though perhaps neither may ever be fully realized in production each sneaks out now and again. We each aspire to mastery, don’t we? Mostly I hear the call to bring the beautiful to light. It falls on people like us to keep reminding the world that it’s worth paying attention to the magic now and then in our own shrinking days.

      To reach our potential we must be attentive to every detail, and we must put ourselves in the mix. On a crisp Sunday afternoon I spent time at a four-year-old’s birthday party, gingerly holding her infant second cousin like a football, to celebrate the next generation tasked with realizing a brighter future. I spent time at a quiet graveyard, reminding those who couldn’t quite realize a full life of their own that they aren’t forgotten. That they did enough. The two sides of the spectrum dancing under the cover of the same brilliant October sky. Some leaves shine golden in their time, some have arrived back to earth. We are the witnesses to each, biding our time on a quest for mastery.

    • Every Leaf is a Flower

      “Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower.” ― Albert Camus

      Today is one of those foggy mornings I especially love in autumn, when the colors of the trees become mystical in their oranges and reds and yellows, muted by the mist but not to be denied. We could learn a thing or two from the autumn leaves about the urgency of the moment. Here we are at the peak of our brilliance: time to shine! Carpe diem indeed.

      For every valley there is a peak, but we forget sometimes that valleys are where forests and gardens thrive. Valleys are where the timeless rivers flow. Valleys can be beautiful too. To spend our days celebrating the beauty of the season we’re in seems the only way to navigate the changes a lifetime brings.

      The question of whether we have peaked ourselves sometimes crosses our minds, but the garden is a good reminder that there are many peaks in a lifetime. Simply persist through the decline of one and embrace the next ascent. A bit of fog now and then matters little in a lifetime of love and growth.

    • The Fullness of Time

      “The measure of a life is a measure of love and respect,
      So hard to earn so easily burned
      In the fullness of time,
      A garden to nurture and protect
      It’s a measure of a life
      The treasure of a life is a measure of love and respect,
      The way you live, the gifts that you give
      In the fullness of time,
      It’s the only return that you expect”
      ― Neil Peart

      I missed a few days in a row of my one line per day journal entry. What exactly did I do on Wednesday? Work from home? Take the dog for a walk? Write a blog and drink too much coffee? Yes to all of those things, but what was the essence of the day? That journal is my daily reckoning. When you go back to it after a few days to fill in what you’ve been up to you quickly realize that much of your days are pretty much the same, repeated over and over again.

      When I look at the year, it’s been full of wonder and adventure. Visits to stunningly beautiful places, big life events in the family, a new puppy. It would be hard to summarize the fullness of this year in a few short sentences. But what of the individual days? Individually, our days are feast or famine, with some jammed full of adventure and others rather bland by comparison. Every day can’t be a lifetime highlight. Some days are simply average.

      Sure, we ought to fill our time with more adventurous fare. Add more micro adventures and left turns to see what is out there in the world. We know intuitively that time is flying by, but what do we do to make each day uniquely special? If today was our last, will we make it an exclamation point or end it all with a simple period? I like to think I’ll go out with an ellipsis (…) just to make the world wonder what I was up to next.

      “The day of my birth, my death began its walk. It is walking towards me, without hurrying.” — Jean Cocteau

      Cocteau reminds us of our impermanence. It’s a lovely vision of life and death coming closer by the day, until one day we meet the infinite once again. Our lives are a singular entry in the vastness of time: here today, gone tomorrow. Knowing this, we ought to raise the average in our average days, we ought to sprinkle in more adventure and mystery and love, we ought to “live like we were dying” as that song goes. Life shouldn’t be a nihilistic series of meaningless days, it ought to be a gift we give back when we’ve done something meaningful with it. We know that our days will pass, but will they be filled with substance? We each have the opportunity to answer in our own…

    • The Choice of Attention

      “If you cannot find it here, you won’t find it anywhere. Don’t chase after your thoughts as a shadow follows its object. Don’t run after your thoughts. Find joy and peace in this very moment. This is your own time. This spot where you sit is your own spot. It is on this very spot and in this very moment that you can become enlightened. You don’t have to sit beneath a special tree in a distant land.” — Thich Nhat Hanh, The Miracle of Mindfulness

      I don’t dabble much in meditation in the classical sense, but lean deeply into awareness. So this very moment means a great deal to this particular time traveler. We dance in the now, or risk having the moment pass us by.

      Yet the time slips by so quickly anyway. This is as it should be, time being the creation of us frenzied humans. Wouldn’t it be better to think in terms of seasons or the natural cycle of a lifetime? Probably, but dinner reservations would be chaotic.

      Awareness of the moment is simply being present and engaged as best we can in this time and place that we live in. I’m quite aware that I have some things to do, and have a mosquito flying annoyingly nearby, and there’s a puppy underfoot restless in her desire to do anything but watch me type. I don’t have to look around to be aware of these things, I just have to be open to receiving them as they roll in like waves, one at a time, and wash across this broad beach of here and now.

      The trade-off, of course, is that awareness of everything around us makes us completely focused on none of them. There is a paradox here, in that we must be fully aware to be fully alive, yet raptly focused on our most important thing in the moment to ensure that thing gets done. We are constantly toeing the line between order and chaos within our brain.

      “Choice of attention—to pay attention to this and ignore that—is to the inner life what choice of action is to the outer. In both cases, a man is responsible for his choice and must accept the consequences, whatever they may be.” — W. H. Auden

      Chaos is all around us, it’s up to us to make sense of it in our own minds. There’s something to the idea of meditation and quieting your mind to receive enlightenment, I’m just not particularly good at sitting still with my breath. Yet I can sit quietly for hours writing, and can walk or row completely focused on the task at hand, aware only of the next step or stroke. Awareness seems to be more essential than enlightenment. One could make a case that they’re one and the same.

      So another day greets us with the choice of where to place our attention. The difference between a meaningful and fulfilling life and a chaotic, empty life is quite literally in our own head. Awareness, applied focus and a sense of purpose or direction are the recipe for a successful life. We choose what to be and have the opportunity to go be it.

    • Incendat Magica

      Don’t lose the wonder in your eyes
      I can see it right now when you smile
      We gotta go back, for a while
      Gotta go back, into that magic time
      — Van Morrison, Magic Time

      I often associate Van Morrison with autumn, thanks in part to the shift in my own soundtrack from summer music to autumn music, which leans more into jazz and soulful introspection. When the jeans replace the shorts it’s time for Van Morrison on my playlist. Some people put up plastic skeletons and black and orange decorations. Some of us stick to music. It’s all part of weaving our own brand of magic.

      I write about magic and wonder quite often in this blog, for it’s the stuff of life. When we create magic we are locking memories into place, like a snapshot we’ll remember forever. At least our forever. We do things that bring joy to our lives, and magic ensues. But let’s face it: Some people in our lives simply aren’t joyful. We may have fun with them, we may even find them interesting or even fascinating to be around, but there’s no joy. No joy, no magic. Simply peaceful coexistence. There’s very little wonder to be found in coexistence. Strike a spark.

      Vivere admirari: To live in wonder.

      Magic is associated with wonder. We often see this on display at big events, and certain places and times in a life. The trick is to dabble in a bit of magic every day, hidden in the joy we bring to moments as they unfold. As with anything joyful, magic works best when shared with others. A spark must have kindling just close enough together to create flame. Too close and you choke out the spark. Too far apart and the spark has nothing to catch hold of. We feel it when it’s just right.

      Incendat magica: To kindle magic

      Perhaps it’s frivolous to write about magic and wonder when the world is so dark and cold. But then again, maybe a spark is just what we need to kindle something warm and bright. We have magic for a reason, don’t we? It changes reality into something more.

    • Do What You Need to Do

      See the moon roll across the stars
      See the seasons turn like a heart
      Your father’s days are lost to you
      This is your time here to do what you will do
      Your life is now, your life is now, your life is now
      In this undiscovered moment
      Lift your head up above the crowd
      We could shake this world
      If you would only show us how
      Your life is now
      — John Mellencamp, Your Life Is Now

      I’m currently read a book set in Provence, and it’s having the expected effect of making me crave a trip there. YouTube videos of the place don’t help, as they only affirm just how beautiful it is there. I’ve had similar dalliances with beautiful places around the world. The world is out there, awaiting the adventurous and the bold. The rest may only dream.

      I do snap out of these moments and reset myself to the now. “Your father’s days are lost to you”, as Mellencamp sang; “This is your time to do what you will do”. It’s October in New Hampshire, with peak foliage and crisp air reminding us that we too live in a beautiful place. It’s high time to be present right here. We are human and sometimes want what we don’t have in our lives. We must consistently remind ourselves to skate our own lane.

      “Death may be close at hand; death may be far off. Transcend death with no-thought, no-idea. Do what you need to do, with no regret.” — Awa Kenzo, Zen Bow, Zen Arrow

      It’s easy to say we ought to transcend and do what we need to do, it’s harder to do it in a world that demands attention. I interrupted my writing flow state on this very blog to correct some puppy behavior and give the dog something else to chew on. Does this mean I’m not fully present in my work, or that I’m fully aware of the larger world around me? Puppies are great reminders that we aren’t fully in control of anything, but we can still fit our own work in. A mountain stream is constantly interrupted by obstacles in its flow, yet it still finds its way to the sea.

      The thing is, none of us is here forever, and all of us are faced with the will of the larger world around us. We may yet shake this world nonetheless if we dream big and persist with our purpose. But we must also remind ourselves to look up from it now and again and see just how beautiful this life actually is. If a puppy or autumn foliage or the mirror remind us of anything, it’s that now will soon be then. As Seneca once said, we must seize what flees: Feel the urgency to do what we need to do, and to do it with no regret.