Goodbye, November! (She said on December the fifth!)

Goodbye, beautiful autumn skies and crunchy leaves!

Goodbye, anything growing and green!

Goodbye lovely dewy spiders' webs!

(and, hello, again! All the spiders have, obviously, moved inside with me where it's warm!)

and, I would say, 'goodbye to autumn mists' but we had the most spectacular 'pea-souper', yesterday!!! I think they'll continue.

After all....it is, technically, still autumn!

This past season, I felt like I was running in a million different directions. I've had too many unfinished projects - I've been going in too many different directions - and it has felt like everything is snatched at and never really completed. I haven't been quite sure how I feel about my photos, either - I'm not focused. I think that many, many of my photos turned out to be a jumble or, at least, my perception of them has been jumbled because that's how my brain has been; so, I put my camera down, this past month, for the first time in fifteen months.

Honestly, it's made me an anxious mess. I'm starting to think that photography must be therapeutic. Well, it's my therapy, anyway. I'm starting to think that I just might even love it more than singing and music and, for me, that's a gasper....

Well, today, I'm resting up after a busy weekend and the completion of quite a few projects and I'm looking at my autumnal images and there are so many that I do like, after all. There was some beautiful, beautiful light... but, now, it's time to move on....move on to winter and Christmas. Part of me just doesn't want to let go.....I still have more to share...

Well, we'll see what happens....

Does anyone else drive their life while looking in the rear view mirror? =] Do any of you ever find that you're not sure about what you've done until a good amount of time has passed? It's almost like I'm too close to the idea, at first, to see it objectively. Then, also, I've noticed with many of my artistic friends that, how we feel about life is so intertwined with how we feel about our images.

What could it all mean.....??? ;)

Charmed, I'm sure!

 I know that it is time to be sharing mellow, autumnal foliage - acorns and Indian corn - but I cannot leave the warmer season behind, quite yet, until I introduce you to a charming acquaintance that I made, back when the late summer/early autumn wild flowers were still blooming.

I was out by the milk house, trying to catch some beautiful late afternoon light that was in between rain storms. The berries were so beautiful and so were the wildflowers that were all around.

This next photo gives you an idea of the swath of beautiful flowers that were surrounding the barns but I never finished getting a proper picture of it all.

I was completely charmed and distracted by this fellow who was in a definite sweet Elysium!

(my first blurry impressions.... ;-))

 

I met him when I turned my camera towards these rain speckled orange flowers. I always love when they come out at the very end of the season. In my mind, I call them 'pumpkin' flowers - obviously, because of their color and because they're everywhere when the pumpkins are just ripening and becoming very exciting. They, also, I have to confess, strongly remind me of one of Cicely Mary Barker's caps for her flower fairies. They're like something a Brownie would wear.


Anyway, what I loved was the way that this little guy would completely crawl into the flower and hang there on his tummy, sipping away with his little, black, fuzzy, stingered behind exposed....

and, then, he would fly off to another flower, crawl in and slurp away....so happy with his task!

We spent a pleasant few moments together and, then, the rain came again and we parted ways and I was charmed to death, indeed!

I can hardly believe that I took this photo a month ago. Only a month ago and, my, how the world has changed! It is frosty and chill and there are no flowers blooming outside, now - only a few leaves still clinging to the trees. It makes me panic, only a little, because I feel that Thanksgiving and Christmas are coming - there's something to look forward to. When I look beyond that to the snow bound, never ending winter of March, though...didn't we just escape it?

Anyway, thank you, mom and dad, for letting me stop the car with almost a screech and giving me five minutes to take these pics of the cosmos glowing in the sun while you waited in the car doing your crossword puzzle, etc.

Alright, here is a poem that seems to fit the weather and the season, I think.

The autumn time has come;

On woods that dream of bloom,

And over purpling vines,

The low sun fainter shines.

The aster flower is failing,

The hazel's gold is paling;

yet overhead more near

The eternal stars appear,

And present gratitude

Insures the future's good,

And for the things I see

I trust the things to be;

That in the paths untrod,

And the long days of God,

My feet shall still be led,

My heart be comforted.

John Greenleaf Whittier