I like to think of myself as "unique". My daughters very kindly refer to me as "quirky". Some others just think I'm weird.
Autumn is my favorite season for a variety of reasons, one of which being the days are becoming shorter by about a minute a day. Yea! I also like a few rainy days now and then, which are more likely in autumn than in summer. And of course, autumn also = the start of football season. Ha! Take that hot, sweaty, sticky summer!
I've become a fairly successful minimalist....except for my collection of coats and jackets. I LOVE coats and jackets. I have light windbreakers, a GoreTex rain jacket, a heeeeeavy LL Bean arctic parka, and a jacket for pretty much everything else in between. This time of year I'm always optimistic it will be a cold enough winter to wear some of them.
Unique, quirky, or weird....I'll answer to any of them. Just don't call me Shirley. :)
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You've heard the old saying, "Make hay while the sun shines"? That's pretty much my work ethic. I feel like if it's still daylight, I should be working or doing one chore or another. When evening comes, it's time to put my tools down, metaphorically, and relax. These days I don't have the energy I once did, so relaxing while the sun is still high sorta bothers me. The earlier it gets dark, the less guilty I feel.
Can you imagine how rested people must have been 150 years ago? When the sun went down there was little else to do but go to bed and sleep, or maybe make more little farm workers. Candlelight barely illuminated the space you were sitting in. Later, coal oil or whale oil lanterns offered a chance to see better later into the night, but those fuels were expensive.
The big breakthrough came with successful oil drilling and refining in the late 1850's. Back then the refined petroleum product of choice was not gasoline or diesel (there were virtually no internal combustion engines back then), but kerosene. Kerosene was a much more affordable fuel, and burned much brighter, too. That gave John D. Rockefeller the light he needed to count his money late into the night. Thomas Edison's electric lighting was just the icing on the cake of illumination progress.
I think today we have it just about right: It gets dark early enough to allow for some rest time before bed, yet a flip of a switch gives us enough light to write unique / quirky / weird blog posts. :)
S
I like autumn as well, even though it's getting too cold in my garage to paint.
ReplyDeleteI've been battling with SWMBO over the a.c., which we have set to come on at 80. At this time of year, I don't want it on except in the middle of the day but she doesn't like the windows to be open as much as I do. Grrrr.
ReplyDeleteOn the subject of outerwear, I still mourn the loss of my authentic navy pea coat, which I left somewhere when I moved from North Dakota to Indiana back in the late 1960's. I hope she(?) enjoyed it.
Indiana didn't do daylight savings till a few years ago.... hmm.... time is passing quickly, but it's been since I moved here! I really enjoyed not having it. It did seem more natural. Autumn is my favorite season as well! At my house, they call me eccentric!
ReplyDeleteThe day to day variance in daylight is huge, depending on latitude....when I lived in Alaska this time of year it was 8 minutes a day, nearly an hour a week. Here in MT it's around 2-3 mins at max. I too like autumn, melancholy sometimes, but still my fav.
ReplyDeleteWhen I lived in Ohio I did not look forward to fall because that meant that Winter was Coming! But maybe I'll relax my stance down here in NC. We shall see.
ReplyDeleteInteresting perspective about feeling guilty if you rest while the sun is still up. I do NOT have that problem. Which might be why my house always needs to be cleaned. :)