November

November 1st, 2018

Ah yes, November has arrived

...and true to its melancholy ways it comes into our lives on the dreariest of days.

Dark, damp, foggy and miserable - October has stolen away with her sunshine and bright blue skies, and the leaves that still cling to the trees try in vain to glow, but it would seem they have been dipped into the most shadowy of mordents  to sadden their brave colours.

So dull and dark are the November days

The lazy mist high up the evening curled,

And now the morn quite hides in smoke and haze,

The place we occupy seems all the world.

John Clare - November.

So that is November!

This photo was taken six years ago, in the early days of November when I was making daily trips to the hospital as my beloved struggled in vain to live, and the memories it evokes do not lighten my spirit, or make me more accepting of November's funereal depicture.....

However, Time has a gracious way of softening life's realities, and memories and gratitude eventually

do teach us acceptance and the way to cope with day to day living.  So last night when the children came around for Halloween I remembered with gratitude the lovely Halloween nights when Charles and I used to dress up to greet them at the door, and the grandchildren came back later for cocoa and cookies, and it was good.

If we must endure November, looking back at happy times 

and looking forward to April brightens the days....

I haven't yet got the Christmas music out but the looms will soon be warped 

with Christmas towels and scarves.

That seems to make November bearable - even pleasurable! 

November comes

And November goes

With the last red berries

And the first white snows.

With night coming early

And dawn comig late,

And ice in the bucket

And frost by the gate.

The fires burn

And the kettles sing,

And earth sinks to rest

Until next Spring.

Elizabeth Coatsworth