Autumn arrived at 8:32PM, last night.....

Yes, it's a few days late, but I still feel it sneaked up on me. According to my calendar, it should have arrived on Sunday. I know it's here now because I was sitting in lawn chairs, having a beer with a few friends when it arrived. Yesterday was a warm day, around 81 degrees I think. It was certainly warm enough to sit around outside well after dark. There I was, laughing at something ridiculous Janet or Tiffany said when a chilly wind blows across us. Everyone shivered, joked about the temperature change and wished that Jody had gotten out the fire pit already. There is was, the death knell for summer. You don't need the fire pit in summer time. The kids starting back to school wasn't enough to convince me or even a few changing leaves. It took the need of a smoking external heat source to convince me that Autumn is here. Yea! I get to pull out my leather boots!!

My friend Maren has a lovely blog, Maren's Musings. If you haven't checked it out yet, there's a link over to the left somewhere. I read hers a day or so ago where she referenced Autumn. I had to laugh when I read her description of geese flying South in a V formation. All through my childhood, I waited to see that. I couldn't wait to see geese flying further south, to a warmer climate. It was in movies, in cartoons, all birds went South. I waited patiently for many years, for the birds to disappear when the weather got cold.

I didn't realize until I was a teenager and pondered it once more that I WAS the South. Geese didn't even fly as far south as Alabama. I saw my first Canadian Goose in Northern Virginia when I was almost 30 years old. It wasn't doing anything spectacular, just standing around near the edge of a field. I made my friend pull over to the side of the highway so I could get a better look. It looked like a goose I'd seen on TV. It wasn't quite the highlight I'd expected.

So now I see them flying in the V shape, year after year. They aren't going anywhere for there winter. They're arriving. I guess I had to move North, to be South for the winter.