As much as possible I like to live without clocks, watches, day-timers, and calendars of any sort. I prefer to fly by the seat of my pants.
You don't need a calendar if you live close to nature and go slow enough to notice what is going on around you. Besides letting you know everything from when to plant to when to lay up stores, it is also soul soothing to experience.
Take our seasonal neighbours that flew in recently. Every year around this time, Canada geese drop in to the field across the road to muster. They eat, nap, eat, nap, poop, flap their big wings, and prepare for their southerly migration.
After lounging in the field all day, dusk hits and they alight in a noisy notice of their short flight to a nearby lake where they spend the night.
The arrival of the geese coincides with subtle colour changes in the forest, amongst other signs that Nature's cycles are moving on, and will do so with us, or without us.
Most notable and potentially distressing, is the drop in temperature, and the slow slide into the coming darkness. We have already lost 3.5 hours of daylight since summer solstice.
On the other hand, we have 3.5 hours more sunlight now than we will have on winter solstice.
I am also grateful for the pile of wood we have laid up in the garage for winter, and for the fact that there are only 182 day/night cycles to go until spring equinox!
Our temporary honky neighbours will most certainly move on before the really cold weather comes. I would go with them, if I could, but I can only fly for about 2 meters at a time and it would be hard to keep up.
Flap, flap, flap!
Instead I will stick around these parts, clean our wood stove, and look forward to the first cozy fire that will inevitably come shortly after the geese leave.
Happy Fall/Spring.
Hello! Love the geese... We went out looking at birds today, after having 8 days basically locked inside our house with Hazardous air quality outside due to Oregon's wildfires...it was wonderful to go out in Good air quality and visit some local spots for birds. We are about the 3 hour mark of lost daylight hours - but I don't mind. More dark, cozy time inside for reading. Hope everyone is doing well and Happy Autumn or Happy Spring to you all. - Mary
ReplyDeleteWe will have Canada Geese our way very soon. Lovely to think that the flock there might be stopping off here on their way to better climes. They stay quite a while here, some all winter. They make their noisy way to the pond across the road each evening. I try to get outside to watch when I can.
ReplyDeleteWishing Everyone a Happy Healthy Equinox.