We finally had a hard frost, and I got to thinking about why that made me happy. What about this time of year, which most people consider dreary and chilly, gives me a predictable sense of well being?
I had to think about that, and my cogitations yielded some possibilities. First, late autumn is when the world goes quiet. The lawnmowers and weed whackers are put away. The jacked up pick-up trucks still go by with their music thumping, but their windows are closed and so, much of the time, are mine. Then too, there’s simply less traffic. More darkness means more staying home, apparently.
Another quality I enjoy about this time of year is that when the sun shines, the daylight is brighter but not hotter. I love big trees and live among them, but once the leaves fall, sunshine comes barreling down from the heavens unimpeded, and my house is actually cheerier for the trees going naked.
Then too, bye-bye bugs! And the hot tea becomes more of a special treat. If we’re having hard frost, climate change hasn’t yet ruined everything. There’s hope!
This season is also when I plant bulbs, and that is my favorite kind of gardening. Toss ’em in, wait a few months. Admire results. No watering or weeding, no waging war against the Japanese beetles or the deer. Just plant, wait, pretty. When I go out to weed the blueberry patch for the umpteenth time (because tenacious weeds came in with the big load of mulch, of course), I’m always a little resentful. All that work for a few cups of 
berries?! Not so with the bulbs.
I like that we get a procession of holidays, from Veteran’s Day onward through February, and I think that has all kinds of benefits. I no longer commute, but a holiday still means a day when I won’t be bothered by work emails, Zoom meetings, work texts (I despise texting, for the most part), or other interruptions. Holidays can be the best writing days, and I treasure those whenever they come.
So I like this bleak, dreary, chilly time of year quite well. My dad was no fan of cold weather whatsoever, to the point that he retired early to San Diego, and there he did stay until his earthly span was concluded some forty-two years later. Dad, who was rail thin, once told me that he loved getting into a closed-up car that had been sitting in the sun, because only then did he finally feel warm. He was serious.
And I am seriously enthralled with this time of year. I perk up, I nest, I write. I feel calmer and more at peace. I would miss the changing seasons, but I always rejoice when the first frost hits.
What is making you rejoice at this otherwise dreary time of year?
I, too, love it when it gets cold out. It’s more comfortable for me to do things outside when it’s not blazing hot. I’d much rather hike in the snow!
As I’ve gotten older, much of the business of the holidays easily becomes too much for me, so I try to be much more low key about holiday times. But so many holidays over the colder itimes is also cheerful.
Casseroles, roasts and stew, sweaters, afghans, a pinch of woodsmoke, moonlight on a skiff of snow, fresh crop apples…
My favorite thing about fall is that my birthday is at the beginning. Of course, that also means I get to be a year older which is both a positive and a negative. Otherwise, I like to look at everybody else’s beautiful fall foliage pictures and that’s about it. Well, okay, I do like the food at the holidays.
As an aside, I am like you, Grace, in that I despise texting (it just seems impolite and intrusive and I don’t need to be that available to the world) and like your father in that I much prefer the heat. I only wish I could afford to move to San Diego!
He saw San Diego when he was a young man in the Navy (World War II). In the early 1940s, San Diego was a pretty sleepy, laid back place–a Navy town mostly. By the time he moved there in 1980, it was a very different city, but still not quite the throbbing (congested) metropolis is it now. He once said that though he was glad he’d made the move, he wouldn’t tell anybody else to go there. Between high costs, local politics, wild fires, water mis-management, earthquakes, and gridlock, it wasn’t “his” San Diego any more.
This is my favorite time of year as well. Today (my birthday! Probably a little bit of a factor in making it my favorite season) I went for a walk down by the Mississippi and marveled at the beauty of the bare trees against the sky and felt the peace of the stillness and pause the natural world is in. It may be my imagination, but I feel sharper and more motivated in the cool weather and I like the coziness inside, coming in to a warm house is a delight.
The thing that gives me joy at this time of year is looking forward to the holidays. Thanksgiving is great fun, with family around and lots of great food. And we usually have a party every month with our musician friends. Last year we had a “Friendsgiving” party in November, but this year we held our last party so late in October that we decided to skip Friendsgiving and move right over to our Christmas party. Cooking and decorating for the holidays brings me joy, almost enough to make up for the fact that I’ll be cold until June. (I can empathize with your Dad wanting to sit in a hot car. The heated seat in my Honda makes winter almost bearable!) Christmas cookies, decorating the trees (which we do with the kids and grandkids right after dinner on Thanksgiving), seeing all the ornaments that were made by family…all these things bring me joy! Stay safe. Stay well everyone!
I agree with all the reasons you stated like the no bugs, loud lawn mowers etc. but for me it is just the winter season itself…the beauty of the whiteness of snow and the crisp cold air that makes everything seem so serene and quiet. The most peaceful and serene times I went horseback riding were in the cold winter white coated isolated trails or farmers fields. Seeing the occasional pheasant, deer, fox and coyote quietly staring back at me while everything around me is white and so very peaceful . Of course the key to enjoying winter is to be properly clothed and protected from the cold.
Also it is the end of the year and it seems I reflect more on what all occurred during that year. Some sad things, some happy memories and just enjoying the quiet time before facing another year and whatever challenges or joys awaiting both me and all my loved ones.
It just seems that the winter season is just the right season to end the year before beginning another.
I’m down in the tropics, so I’m celebrating turning off the A/C & opening the windows! I can finally garden in comfort without being nuked by triple digits of heat combined with enough humidity to steam veggies. Mosquitoes are gone & all the migratory birds are back, including some mated pairs who visit annually to nest.
My roses come out of their summer hibernation & I have a few blooms on my lavender, which did NOT appreciate all the hurricanes soaking the ground for months on end. I can put more than a sheet on my bed & sleep with a window open to get fresh air. Plus heating the oven doesn’t heat the house, so I can bake to my heart’s content & freeze all the leftovers for when the heat returns. Best of all, I can pull out my teapot & enjoy hot tea instead of iced.
I agree, hoar frost is beautiful, but I am no fan of the cold. I’m a winter solstice baby so I’m happy to celebrate in December, and seeing friends over the Christmas holidays is fun. And being cozy indoors and looking out at blowing snow (especially when I don’t have to shovel it) does make me happy.
Having a working kitchen sink – in about 3 days now – after moving back into our home in early August.
I guess I am the grump at the party because this is NOT my favorite time of year. I hate being cold, and I don’t like the short days. Also Thanksgiving has become a non-holiday since my family has gotten smaller and smaller, and I miss that. We do still manage to cobble together a Christmas get together, but I miss the old days of confusion and lots of people and color and food and laughter. Ah well. Spring will always come again. PS Don’t forget Paul Anderson in Stanardsville, Virginia this coming weekend!! Scottish fiddle playing at its finest, and a brawny lad in a kilt. What’s not to like!!
The two holidays when family from far away can gather just for the one fact they can be together without guilty feelings of “I should do…
Warmer weather although a grand time make us want to work outside more than inside where we can just relax and maybe do nothing.
It’s been forever since I visited (hello again), but I’m rejoicing because the semester is nearly over. I’ve been drowning in grading this term, and I’m just ready to be on the other side of it. You’ve inspired me to have some tea, though. <3
I love the browns and russet of the fallen leaves, the scents of them. And it makes me happy to see the contours of the land though the trees. So much less claustrophobic.
Talking about the coming of winter…I recently read about “the year without a summer” (1816) when the eruption of Mt Tambora caused a volcanic winter in Europe and North America with crop failures, famine, riots, etc. The societal effects were pretty severe. Are we past this summer already in the chronology of the Lord Julian series? Just wondering… I took note that C.S.Harris incorporated the Frost Fairs of 1814 in her regency mystery series. Maybe I’m just obsessed with the weather because I’m Canadian!
I love a cozy fire and a hot beverage. It’s cold where I am, and often dreary. I’m not a fan of the dreary. Cold and sunny I can take, cold and cloudy for long periods is hard for me. I think I was a plant in a previous life and still retain vestiges of phototropism, so I lean in the sun. I love to watch the snow fall if I don’t have to go out in it.