That Blue October Sky

Try explaining how blue the October sky is, how it grips even the loneliest spots on Earth and in the mind until they glow and seem meaningful when the rest of the year we don't look twice. 

 

Driving home I saw this sight and could have kept driving but scolded myself, "Time was when you'd turn around, stop, park and stand in the road to take a picture to share with everyone so they could see what you see, feel the reverence, how great it is to live here and now. Is that time gone? Are you old or just lazy? Maybe taking it for granted? What about beauty? What about awe?"

 

So I found a place to park and backtracked up the road, walking past a field of dead sunflowers on long thick stems much taller than I, with weird little gray birds shooting in and out of them. I stopped and saw they were goldfinches, not lemon-yellow anymore but wearing their duller winter corduroy. High winds roiled the grasses and treetops and filled my ears. If a car were approaching I would have to feel it through my feet. But there was no other car and I got my photo. Happy October.

R & R & T

I am a workaholic and realized I almost never spend whole days outdoors anymore. So out I go into the mists of October, scaring packs of deer who apparently thought this property was all theirs.

I have now re-engaged with recreation and hobbies. A two-mile walk today on an unexpectedly steep new trail I balanced with a half-hour of leisure in the zero-gravity chair with a pot of hot tea.

I'm taking Russian-language classes and barre classes. The Russian teacher lived four years in Moscow. She says, "Russia is the only country in the world where a poetry reading can fill a stadium." I plan to live on my Social Security in the lovely Silk Road city of Samarkand, Uzbekistan. They all speak Russian, and I'm glad they do, because there's no Uzbek-language classes around here.

Barre classes are ballet-inspired workouts but without the impact. I bought a package of 10 one-hour classes to deliberately invest too much to waste them. One hour in class draws only the most determined and addicted, because barre is torture and whips up those endorphins like, whoo-ee. The regulars -- there are lots! -- are all trim through the middle and have built a genuine booty. That's right, a booty worth writing home about. If I get one, I will post it. Twenty years older than most participants, I sometimes lag but never quit and after three classes am catching on.

Later I'll practice my bongos.

Slow Down, You Move Too Fast

As the year ages like fine wine, I woke planning a hike at mid-morning today, then was deluged with messages and calls demanding instant action everywhere at once, and could have worked 16 hours and maybe get through it all, but then I thought about my ancestors who'd say "What foolishness," and after working all morning fixed a nice lunch and furthermore, sat down and ate it, and don't care who knows it. I settled for an afternoon walk at Glassberg Conservation Area, circling its three-acre lake I sometimes fish in. (I didn't fish even once this summer; too busy.) An odd little gem of an island in that lake, you see here.

November hikes must be short and planned. After 2 p.m. the shadows lengthen by the minute; after 3 p.m., about the time this photo was snapped, the hills begin swallowing the sun, and rocks and streambeds exhale icy breath; after 4 p.m., darkness unwraps its chilly lengths and nothing stops it. The bright side: Only five more weeks until the daylight begins lengthening.