Indecision

Walk location: neighborhood
Walk time: early morning
Temperature: 55 degrees
Skies: partly cloudy and breezy
Steps: 8,600
iPod: David McCullough's Truman

The weather seems as indecisive today as I am. I awakened early this morning, as is my habit, and decided to sleep a little longer since it is Saturday and the house is blessedly quiet. Within forty-five minutes at my bedside was whining Gizmo, ready to walk. His sense of the day's rhythm is more profound than mine, it seems. In ten minutes we were outside, the early morning light piercing through the ebbing darkness.

I am befuddled. It is late September, and yet it feels like an August morning. With October knocking at our door it still warm enough at night to sleep with windows open, and during the day feels stuffy in the house by about 3 in the afternoon. It is a lovely fall, perhaps making up for our cool, wet, late spring.

As we walked this morning we watched various colored leaves flittering in the wind as they make their descent from branch to grass below. Beneath many hardwoods is a symmetrical quilt, a panoply of colored leaves. This has come to be my most enjoyable season of the year, with the return to schedule, regularity and the fullness of harvest all around.