Fourteen degrees as a daytime high is somewhat easier to take now that the calendar reads December…even if that same calendar assures me that winter is, technically, still more than two weeks away. We are on the far side of fall. The autumnal show is over: the leaves, having revealed their not-green alter egos, have…
In this interval, we hauled the hay, stacked the wood, stowed the cushions from the outdoor furniture. We transported the flowerpots that spent the summer adorning the decks around the house down the hill to the greenhouse. If the plants survive the travails of overwintering, they’ll take the ride uphill again in spring; otherwise they’ll…
Revolting. If you had asked me when I was a kid what I thought of tomatoes, that’s probably the word I would have offered—or “gross” maybe, or “disgusting” when I was a little older. Actually, you probably wouldn’t have had to ask. If a tomato, or slice or dice thereof, was anywhere in my vicinity,…
I thought about writing about these fall days: the glossy blue skies, the serene air, the landscape golden and splashed with umber and gilt. The temperature hovers in that curious cool-mild zone, so you go out wearing a jacket but you’re soon too warm and have to strip to shirtsleeves. You need keep the jacket…
I promised myself last spring it wouldn’t happen again: the summer, this year, would not spiral out of control. I would manage my time, balance my obligations, ride herd on my expectations. But the summer got away from me. Again. I can never figure out how this happens, can never reconstruct where, exactly, the days…
Years ago, reflecting on our move from the outskirts of Boulder, Colorado to the more rural center of the state, I wrote about planning the space that would be our garden in the mountains: Despite the high elevation, short growing season, and abundant wildlife…we knew we wanted a garden, so we built a walled one,…
Talking to me about his business junket in late September, my husband described watching helplessly as one of his traveling companions, tripped up by someone’s luggage in an airport corridor, executed one of those multi-step forward stagger maneuvers. The fellow fought to regain his balance, throwing his legs out over and again, finally catching himself…
I walked out of the house with no aim other than to go somewhere and sit: no destination, no errand, not even a camera to box in my attention. I’m not noodling a conundrum from a piece of writing left back on the desk and I’m not on the hunt for sensory titillation that might…
The iconography of changing colors garners plenty of attention this time of year. Deservedly so, I suppose; even here, where the most charismatic foliage species are pretty rare, there’s a good show. The mounded forms of currant and mountain mahogany flare like earthbound mini fireworks, puffs of red and orange lighting up the meadows. The…
For once, it wasn’t me. The party running late, this time, was autumn. Oh sure, the light changed, spearing over the land at that long low angle that first alerts me summer is waning. And, yes, leaves of sticky geranium and Rocky Mountain penstemon flared scarlet here and there against a backdrop of grass cured…