Gales of November

I woke up this morning to grey, blustery skies and, for the first time in many months, a fire crackling and spitting in the wood stove. The weather is heavy into its late autumn transition. Except for a few deep orange needles clinging to the tamaracks, the autumn colors now decay on the forest floor and soon the snowbirds that flock on the roadside will all flutter south. With the time change over the weekend, evenings are dreadfully dark affairs, so we make our own light with candles, Netflix, and early bedtimes.

It would seem like a time to seriously contemplate hibernation, but instead, this morning found me up before my alarm and at my desk during the 7 a.m. hour. If the weather is too grim to run in, then I figured I might as well be at work, charting out the day and week and month to come and trying to wrap my arms around the winter ahead.

I'm coming to realize that most things of note in life stem from one conscious and deliberate decision. Want to become a better knitter? Start taking on more complicated patterns and rip out and redo the stuff that doesn't turn out right. Want to be a runner? Buy some shoes and go out the door, already! Tired of drifting through your days with no apparent direction? Chart out a work schedule and get on with it. Intuition and "feeling things out" only get you so far. We can bitch about transitions and wait until things feel "just right" until the cows come home, but at some point in time, we have to stop mooning about and just get down to business.

Granted, it's been a busy couple week of social engagements so I should be kind and forgiving to myself if my productivity since transitioning back to working from home hasn't been all it could be. On Saturday I toddled down to Duluth for an overnight/game night with a group of college friends. We've managed to do an annual "holiday" get together every year since graduation, despite the fact that we've been busy accumulating jobs, pets, husbands, and babies as time goes by. It's always lovely to catch up and I always wish we could spend just a little more time together.

It's also worth noting that while I did not really do anything to, you know, generate income last week, I did make a decent dent in the third book of George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series. At long last, I have finally passed the plot that HBO has already released on Game of Thrones. Whew! But you guys, good golly it is taking me a long time to read these books! At the moment it's taking me nearly 3.5 months to plow through each volume. I may love me some libraries, but there is no way I would have made it through these books in the library's allotment of 28 days. 

Whether or not you're bracing again the gales of November today, I hope your week is off to a smashing start and that you've got a good book or two to get you through these darkening days.