There's the faintest tang of coolness in the air that sets me scurrying to hoard enough seeds and nuts to make it through the coming winter. Leaves are beginning to drop from the dry spell, but it seems to me there are far more than can be chalked up to lack of rain. It's far more likely to be sunny and cheery late into October, and the palm trees seem out of place when I'm in the mood for colorful maples and aspen groves. It doesn't matter. I'll still make my seasonal change of china, putting away the pinks and purples and yellows in favor of blacks and greys and golds.
Time rolls on.
My father is through with chemotherapy. The cancer has been pronounced eradicated, so he and Mary Lou are off to the Oregon coast for a long week of golfing and beachcombing. They'll continue on to Hawaii for a couple of weeks where I hope Dad will regain some weight and maybe a bit of hair. By the end of next month they'll be ready for their annual migration south to the desert, another one of my seasonal markers. I look for the ragged V of geese, the blooming of spider chrysanthemums, and the phone call telling me they're on their way.