Fall Reset

Return to school has come and gone without me.  As I toured Tennessee in late August, Virginia Tech, U of TN, and Vanderbilt had already moved in for the fall semester, leaving me unable to find a parking space near the bookstore at two of them.  When I returned home, Labor Day weekend got set aside with a higher priority, surviving highly symptomatic Covid-19.  I missed the in-person first week of OLLI.  Practicalities for my Designated Driver forced my follow-up EGD from the fall to the winter.  My vegetable garden did not have significant yield.  The Holy Days come late on the secular calendar.  It's been a tough transition.

While delayed a couple of weeks, I'm sufficiently recovered to engage in autumn activities.  This being a Presidential year, I voted in the local primaries, will learn more about the candidates, national and local, on my screens this week, and affirm that my preferences are sound.   I am ready for my mid-September Torah reading, then begin polishing the YK reading.  I have to greet electronically three old friends.  My kids plan to visit for RH.  I will need to assemble challenging dinners for RH and the Sukkah.  OLLI invited me to give a presentation which will need priority focus.  Exercise collapsed with travel and illness.  That needs restoration with judicious pacing.  

The final quarter of the calendar year brings a reconing of my semi-annual initiatives, some going well, others disappointing but salvagable. 

And throw in some recreation, fishing, maybe golf, drawing, photos.  Football has not engaged me as the NFL and colleges resume, but I should consider a live game.  And perhaps a day in NYC.

While our calendar year begins in January, our activity transition remains in proximity of Labor Day.

Seasonal Chill

Winter clothing gets exchanged each year on October 1.  That date is arbitrary but easy to remember.  It's a reasonable match to the weather, though never a perfect one.  This year the need for long sleeves arrived little before and summer shorts have not been worn since a heat wave crossed Paris during my visit there a few weeks back.  I keep a few out of season items aside in anticipation of a variation between calendar and forecast.  Some long sleeve shirts on hangers in the closet though the no-iron knits remain in the storage duffle until the change of month arrives next week.

I personally like the early chill.  Even with some rain, or maybe especially with some rain, there is an element of refreshment.  I have a couple of nylon windbreakers just right for this circumstance.  With the Holy Days and Sukkot, I spend more time in the synagogue, which also means a sports coat and occasionally my last properly fitting suit.  Sandals go into storage with other summer things in favor of sturdier shoes, as I am not anticipating vacationing in anyplace warm before next spring.  Bought a pair of New Balance cross-training shoes which will become staples, and need some minor repair on my disappointing Sperry Topsiders which also function as go with most things basics.

I never put outerwear into storage.  But I do at the start of needing some gather mine in one section of the downstairs closet.  They get arrayed roughly by how cold it must be to justify wearing each jacket or coat.  Each coat has a cap and gloves in its pockets.  The hats and scarves for very cold situations stay in an upstairs box, usually tapped into once or twice a season when only a Peruvian Wool Hat with ear extensions will do.

So just a windbreaker today.

Next High Holy Days

The Holy Days are my demarcation point, or more accurate part of a larger demarcation point, the transition from summer to fall.  It's a change from a few months with few appointments to the remainder of the calendar year with many.  OLLI, Yom Tovim, doctors appointments, football games I want to watch, all needing me to be in a place at a set time.  This year all begin within proximity of my grand experience in Europe, OLLI and football while away, Holy Days and Doctors on return.

I'm not terribly enthused about what awaits.  I opted to sit out AKSE's High Holiday Honors program for the second consecutive year.  There have been incidents in which I cannot frame the encounters other than having been treated poorly by people of influence.  I never thought I would report one of these encounters to their President in the way I would fill out an incident report for the ADL or my medical center, but I did.  But I also took the view that I will not use hurtful speech in response.  I will withhold money, which is my response for opting out of their High Holy Day honors, with this year's invitation a lot more expensive activity than an Ark Opening.  I am the YK Torah reader again and should be in optimal form.

Ordinarily I focus more on food and on guests.  Daughter coming for YK, though after shabbos dinner.  Very simple prefast dinner.  For YK I like to make my own round challah.  OLLI classes in the morning make this unrealistic but I can make a honey cake.  There are elaborate recipes that challenge me, but with more restricted time, a simple one this year.  Wife does the rice kugel as her annual contribution to our festive table.  I make carrots, though Mesorah Heritage Foundation sent me a card with blessings for other traditions like beets and cabbage.  Carrots are easy.  I found an economical porgy, so this year a whole fish with its head on and eyes inviting us to eat it.  And a simple chicken.  Also found a Tabachnick's chicken soup with noodles that can be warmed in boiling water.  And shabbos style baked chicken breast and purchased round challah.  So it will be a full festive meal, though less my effort than other years.

I've not yet unpacked my main suitcase after two full days home.  Do this while honey cake bakes.  And usually for RH I put some effort into appearance.  Suit first day.  Sports coat second day.  Nice shoes, polished.  White kippot.  Beard trimmed, hair groomed, nails filed.  But still tacky smartwatch not really suitable for shabbos.  Maybe I'll wear one with a dial instead.

The Holy Days, while officially ten, really extend most of the month of Tishrei.  We have a command to be happy on Sukkot, and I try.  The time for guests to come and this year to be somebody else's guest.  Effort into constructing and decorating the Sukkah.  Some pageantry of the Lulav.  The season typically ends on a more satisfying note than it begins.  

And by then I've learned things at OLLI and know how my team's seasons are likely to play out.

OLLI Resumes

It's been a good summer off.  Made it to downstate destinations, made it across to the America's opposite coast, welcomed a new Rabbi who has made Saturday morning a more desirable destination for me.  Some of my anticipated mental activity did not fare as well, and the lazy hazy days of summer did not generate a very good work ethic.  But the fall transition begins soon, delayed a week by my long anticipated trip to Europe. 

Fall has always been my favorite season, a transition from amusement to achievement, though not to the total obliteration of amusement.  We have the Holy Days.  College Football begins this weekend.  School now resumes before Labor Day in many places, with the Back to School ads largely gone as retailers look ahead to Halloween.  And travel gets a little less spontaneous.  It's hard to be my Best Me in the hot summer.  Fall seems more conducive to effort.  And a week or so in France may be just the right inflection point.

While I am overseas, the Osher Institute's Fall semester resumes.  Three of the teachers have sent me their syllabus or introduction for four of the five classes in which I have enrolled.  Three of the four will follow a video series, either a Great Courses program with discussion or independent weekly DVDs related to the topic.  The other seems more a lecture format.  The fifth, a lecture series on the New Testament will remain a surprise until my first class.  Four of the five are on site at the OLLI Campus which immerses me with people after something of a summer lapse, only partially compensated by my renewed and honestly unanticipated affinity for my weekly synagogue attendance.

School restores a focus on work as a primary activity.  My mind engages during the class presentations, but it also engages in conversation, looking at the artwork that they hang on the walls, walking on the campus grounds wondering about the plants.  I will sometimes bring my laptop, particularly if I have two classes separated by a lunch break, or my writing portfolio if I don't.  Leaving the house to get there, about a twenty-minute drive each way, reinforces that this is a destination, one not easily duplicated at home.

So some time in France to conclude the summer, then the sometimes serious business of being an active senior.

Fall Clean-up

Transitioning from outdoors to indoors takes more than one form.  Some outdoor tasks include taking down the sukkah, storing it for next fall.  My garden has probably produced its lasts, though there might still be a pumpkin to be had.  I'll need to take out a big bag, then one square at a time remove what currently occupies each of the thirty-six squares.  The deck needs to have stuff for next summer brought inside, though the antigravity recliner, used far less than I had hoped, seems to survive its winters outside.  I assume the umbrella bases will as well, though the umbrella itself would keep better indoors.  And I have disappointing planters outside my front door.  Rosemary can be salvaged indoors, but it already died.  Spearmint also looks dead but tends to resurrect itself each spring.  For my big pot, I'll make pesto from the remaining basil, then replant it next spring.  

I also have some outdoor tasks.  Have given up on leaf raking.  The lawnmower's mulching seems adequate.  My snowblower has not worked in two years.  This November I will make it work, even if I have to follow the YouTube repair directions one word at a time.

As I come indoors for a few months, the indoors need to be optimal.  I am committed to using my fireplace for the first time in years, and using it safely.  Again, some targeted work.  I spend the majority of each day in My Space irrespective of season.  That needs to be as close to optimal as my energy allows.

So I seem to have much to do.  Allot a few small moves forward each day.

Summer's Demarcation

I'm not quite ready to relinquish my summer.  Ordinarily the close of summer energized me as I looked ahead to a new school year, the fall Holy Days, building a sukkah, college football at least once in the stadium, colorful leaves, and a brisk chill.  It's been arriving earlier.  Schools now open a week or two before Labor Day.  The Holy Days appear this year about as early in the secular calendar as they can.  College football can wait, but the West Chester game remains cheap entertainment if they allow spectators this season, even cheaper if they don't.

Since my semi-annual segment starts in July, summer comprises the first third, a preparation for those performance SMART goals.  I did pretty well with the preparation.  The time to Thanksgiving focuses more on execution, which can be a lot more challenging, but I seem ready.  OLLI commences this week informally, formally next week.  I know how to make a YouTube video, now I have to make three of them to fulfill the goal.  I just began my third book, an audio novel.  My writing could be better.  I've committed to travel, two more minor day excursions and one more grand.  While getting ready to entertain guests by serious housekeeping, I'm ready to invite some.  The Family Room has some plans for completion.

Decent summer.  Ready for a terrific fall, even when it arrives a little early.

Senses of Autumn

Fall has arrived.  Elections soon, some uncertainty of outcome this time, at least nationally thought state and local races fairly predictable.  Have gotten used to school buses on the local streets.  I look at whether the Mizzou game will be on TV each weekend.  Made a half-hearted attempt to put summer clothing into plastic bags which can be reduced in size with a vacuum cleaner though the chill has not yet arrived for taking out anything warmer than a sports coat.  On a drive to Baltimore last weekend, multicolored leaves lined I-95.  The brews of Oktoberfest can be had by the twelve-pack at the Total Wine store.  This past weekend I started menu design for Thanksgiving weekend which includes the holiday, shabbat the next day and wife's birthday a few days beyond, all of which merit some special kitchen effort. The Holy Days have come and gone, setting the caricature of synagogue in storage for another year while the real experience of shabbat takes precedence.

In many ways fall has become work time, preparation for winter, ridding the garage of clutter so that the cars can be sheltered, raking leaves, for my kids studying for exams.  But there are opportunities for down time with some special sensations.  Every coffee place has its version of pumpkin spice and every brewer has some seasonal recipe not available the rest of the year.  Soon the clocks will revert to standard time, making it dark both on arising and returning home each day.

All five senses.  Sight of color.  Sounds of cheerleaders.  Touch of fleece in the gloves.  Aroma of leaves that the neighbors decided to incinerate.  And the taste of some Pumpkin Spice coffee made in the coffee press while waiting for the sun to rise.