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NOVEMBER OF 2011
The World Is Flat
The civilized man has built a coach, but has lost the use of his feet.... A Greenwich nautical almanac he has, and so being sure of the information when he wants it, the man in the street does not know a star in the sky. The solstice he does not observe; the equinox he knows as little; and the whole bright calendar of the year is without a dial in his mind.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance
Almanacs came of age in modern, scientific times. They were the first popular documents to espouse the radical, sense-defying beliefs of the new astronomy. "The world is round," those almanackers said. "Contrary to what our eyes seem to tell us, Earth is not the level, stationary center of the universe. We are inhabitants of an insignificant asteroid which is spinning at soul-splitting speed through infinite space for all eternity."
Almanacs were partial to other kinds of bizarre information. Not only did they provide astronomical pronouncements, such as the above, with statistics to support their assertions, they sought out the most sensational and peculiar news items. They were the check-out counter tabloids of their times. They printed exceptions when other genres printed rules.
Novelty was absolute. And quantity was far more important than quality; if a man had lived to be one hundred and fifteen, almanackers cared little whether or not he had had a good life. How many times or how long something was supposed to have happened was considered more noteworthy than other characteristics of the event itself.
The obsession for the uncommon soon perverted even the simple pleasures of gardening. That someone should have grown a tomato was hardly worthy of mention; tomatoes were easy givens in the equations of horticulture. That someone should have grown a record-breaking, behemoth tomato was always something else again.
Such values have survived to this very day. In my capacity as Poor Will, I once was called to the house of a woman who had probably grown the fattest tomato of the season in all of in my town of Yellow Springs. Unfortunately, however, my visit was delayed several days, and when I arrived, the prize had decayed to an unpleasant smelling, olive-green mass, an amorphous wad of mush.
But the lady had preserved it for me anyway in a plastic bag. She pulled it from the refrigerator, and held it up for me to see. "It's not what it was," she admitted, but she showed me a piece of paper on which were written its impressive former circumference and weight. The idea of the great tomato transcended its demise. The bag of foul-smelling flesh and seeds was of more significance than
some small, sweet, red specimens that lay before us on the table, flushed and firm in the prime of their edible lives.
Early almanacs flourished not only because of their exploitation of the outlandish, and their glorification of the oversized, but because they appealed to authority of data in itself. Feathered with easily understood tables of weight and measures, the almanacker's nest held eggs of surprising and less ordinary dimensions: predictions about the risings and settings of planets, the arrival of comets and occultations and eclipses of the sun and moon. And most of the readers, never matching the events with the supposed times, were comforted simply to believe that the turning of the firmament could be measured.
When I was just learning how to calculate moonrise and moonset, I discovered that the information printed in my metropolitan daily paper was completely wrong. I called to inform the editors of their error; they apologized, but added that no one had ever complained about the problem before. For as far back as I cared to check in the newspaper archives, moonrise and moonset had been miscalculated. Half a million readers had never cared enough to match the data with the occurrence. Or maybe if someone had tried, he or she had given up in frustration, attributing the problem to personal incompetence.
It is not enough to reason that all data is somewhat arbitrary, and that the world spins on assumptions and creeds that may or may not really and truly be valid. Such naiveté is the almanacker's profit. It is the naiveté that embraces size over taste, numbers over experience.
Personal observation and existential fortitude are the only antidotes for such spiritual torpor. And the first step on the journey to intellectual liberation is to have enough courage to say what your senses have told you since you were born: that the world is flat.
Explorers may sail west in order to go east; rockets may go to the moon; satellites may send us electrical impulses that many interpret to be pictures of a "round" earth. You believe their messages at the risk of losing your soul. A healthy skepticism toward vicarious science will keep you from living in a place in which the sun and moon rise only on charts, where distance is measured by the speed of light, and where circumference is the equivalent of flavor.
A flat world is accessible to everyone, and it offers challenge enough. When you have come to its edge, having found your way by the stars you can name from the closed dome above, there will be time enough for other notions.
LATE FALL:
THE TWELFTH & FINAL SEASON OF THE NATURAL YEAR 2011
(Late Fall typically occurs in late November and December across the South, in November along the 40th Parallel, and in October or early November east of the Rocky Mountains in the states immediately below the Canadian Border.)
Along the highways, ironweed seeds are soft and white when Late Fall comes. Goldenrod and thimbleweed are tufted like cotton, their foliage deep chocolate brown. Most of the milkweed pods have opened. Although many of the Osage orange, oak, beech, pears and sweet gum continue to hold on, the last ginkgoes lose their leaves, magnolias weaken, and cherry foliage turns brown at the edges.
Scarlet rose hips and the buds of pussy willows stand out against the bare landscape. Mock orange, honeysuckles and forsythias are thinning; their leaf-fall measures the progress of the last phase of autumn. Thistles are bedraggled, foliage curled and shriveled. Fields of dry goldenrod heads glow in the sun, more exotic than when they were in flower. Box elder seeds shimmer in the frost. Sharp burdock burrs are poised, waiting for you to brush against them.
When next year’s skunk cabbage pushes through the mud, summer still retains enough momentum to hold off Early Winter a little longer. Starlings are still gathering in the wood lots. Autumn violets and pansies can still be blooming. Waterstriders still hunt in the sloughs. A few daddy longlegs are left in the old wood nettles and touch-me-nots. A few bees still come out, and moths emerge when the temperatures rise into the 60s.
Once in a while, dandelions blossom, appear out of season like overwintering robins showing up through the fall and winter. Wild onions and the garden garlic grow a bit when the weather is mild. Motherwort is still strong. Moss has new sprouts, a promise of February and March on old logs. The grass along the freeways has turned pale, but winter wheat sometimes grows an inch or so, creating wide patches of deep green in the dying landscape. When Late Fall is cold, snow sometimes blankets the northern tier of states, and it may stay on the ground until the deepest thaws of Early Spring.
Cardinals sing off and on throughout the day. Squirrels chatter. Opossums and raccoons increase their activity in the warmer evenings. Woolly bear caterpillars, the latest of the year, hurry across the roads when the sun shines. Sparrows fight for seeds. Crows congregate for winter as the sandhill cranes depart. In warmer climates, like that of southern California, daisy trees and golden sennas are in bloom. Pink blossoms appear on the silk floss trees, and maroon and ivory flowers on the Dutchman’s pipe vine. Along the Rio Grande, cascalote trees are blooming. In Baton Rouge, the exotic gingers are still open.
A CALENDAR OF HOLIDAYS AND SPECIAL OCCASIONS
FOR RANCHERS AND HOMESTEADERS
November 6, 2011: Eid Al-Adha: Today is the Festival of Sacrifice for Muslims. Kids and lambs weighing approximately 70 pounds can be sold to this market.
November 7, 2011: Ecuadorian Independence Day
November 24, 2011: Thanksgiving Day: If you are not selling turkeys to this market, why not plan to do so next year?
November 26, 2011: Al Hijira: Islamic New Year: No religious significance, but like many New Year celebrations, is a cultural event. Many Muslims, however, reflect on Muhammad’s migration from Mecca to Medina, called the Hijra, at this season.
THE SUN in NOVEMBER
By November 7, the sun’s will be approximately seventy percent of the way to winter solstice. On November 12, the sun reaches three-fourths of the way to winter solstice. In November’s third week, the rate of increase in the length of the night finally begins to slow to about ten minutes in seven days instead of fifteen minutes. That good news comes none too soon: by the time the sun enters Sagittarius on the 22nd, sunrise time is close to half an hour later than it was on Halloween, and sunset time is just a few minutes from its earliest setting time of the year.
By the end of November, the day is just 15 minutes shy of its shortest span, and sunset is within two minutes of its earliest setting time of the year. On the 30th, the sun’s declination reaches 21 degrees 37 minutes, just a little less than 90 percent of the way to winter equinox.
November 6 - Sunday: Daylight Savings Time Ends
Set clocks back one hour at 2:00 a.m.
November 22: Traditional date for the sun’s entry into Sagittarius
A CALENDAR OF NOVEMBER STARS
The early night sky of November 28th offers one the most spectacular stellar displays of the year, but it promises little warmth. Still, the stars are not fixed, and, in their movement, they become the most precise of allies.
An hour before sunrise, before the first color gives the time of day away, look south again, and imagine it is still evening instead of close to dawn. Then you'll see the sky has moved into its evening position for spring equinox. Eight hours – that is, four months in star time – from the wintry evening message of Orion - all the signs of cold are setting in the west.
Regulus, centered overhead, announces the first bloom of violet cress and the full bloom of crocus. June's Arcturus is well up in the east. Warm Spica lies along the horizon. The Corona Borealis, the crown of peonies and iris and lily-of-the-valley, rises nearby. Vega has come full circle, is guiding Deneb and the Swan back from the northeast.
It's a matter of perspective. The morning sky is always four months ahead of the evening sky. Eight hours after you see Orion, he's gone. In four hundred eighty minutes, eight hours, the stars have moved one hundred twenty days, well past the flowering of aconites and red maples, almost to daffodils.
THE MAJOR PLANETS IN NOVEMBER
Venus in Ophiuchus flirts with the eastern horizon before dawn, and with the western horizon around sundown. Find Mars in Leo (east of Cancer) about 3:00 a.m., and Jupiter in Aries will be setting into the west at that time. Saturn in Virgo rises just before dawn.
LUNAR PHASES
A resurgence of summer growth often occurs in most states in milder years under the Second Spring Moon, providing late pasture for livestock and welcome patches of color in the woods and in the garden. Sandhill cranes move south as Second Spring reaches its close, and the haunting cries of the cranes bring in Early Winter, the first season of 2012, under the Sandhill Crane Migration Moon.
October 26: The Second Spring Moon is new at 2:56 p.m.
November 2: The moon enters its second quarter at 11:38 a.m.
November 10: The moon is full at 3:16 p.m.
November 18: The moon enters its final quarter at 10:09 a.m.
November 25: The Sandhill Crane Migration Moon is new at 1:10 a.m.
December 2: The moon enters its second quarter at 4:52 a.m.
THE S.A.D. STRESS INDEX
The average length of November’s night is almost as great as the night’s length in December and January; the weather becomes more severe, and clouds thicken. The sun reaches within a few minutes of its earliest setting time, and mornings darken. Although the holidays bring relief for some people, many others find that seasonal stress comes from social as well as from meteorological sources.
Key for Interpreting the S.A.D. Index:
Totals of:
75 - 65: S.A.D. Alert: Severe Stress for those who suffer from seasonal affective disorders
64 - 50: Severe to moderate stress
49 - 35: Moderate stress
34 - 25: Light to moderate stress
24 and below: Only people with extreme sensitivity to S.A.D. experience seasonal affective disorders below an Index reading of 24.
Day Clouds Weather Dayl Totals
November 1: 11 13 21 45
November 10: 13 17 23 53
November 20: 16 16 23 55
November 30: 19 18 24 61
PEAK ACTIVITY TIMES FOR LIVESTOCK, FISH, GAME & DIETERS
Fish, game, livestock and people tend to feed more and are more active as the barometer is falling one to three days before the weather systems that arrive near the following dates on which cold fronts normally cross the Mississippi River: November 2, 6, 11, 16, 20, 24 & 28. Fishing and hunting are most rewarding and dieting is most frustrating near these dates at midday when the moon is new, in the afternoon and evening when the moon is in its first quarter, at night when the moon is full and in its third quarter, in the morning when the moon is in its fourth quarter.
WEATHER SYSTEMS OF NOVEMBER
The weather estimates that appear with each month are based on my charts of fractal weather patterns made between 1978 and 2011. Readers of my weekly and monthly columns throughout the United States have used these estimates successfully since 1984. For best results, readers in the East should add 1 to 2 days to specific days mentioned in the overviews. In the West, subtract 1 to 2 days.
If strong storms occur this month, weather patterns suggest that they will happen during the following periods: November 2 - 5, 14 - 16 and November 21 - 27. This year, full moon on November 10 and new moon on November 25 increase the likelihood of a late hurricane coming ashore along the East Coast or a powerful, snow-bearing cold wave moving across the Plains.
November's average temperatures fall at the rate of approximately one degree every two days in most of the nation. Average wind speed increases to its winter level throughout the year’s eleventh month, and it will remain relatively high until early May. By the end of November, a killing frost can be expected well into Alabama. In December, freezing temperatures can even occur in southern Florida. Weather history indicates that cold waves will cross the Mississippi around the dates listed below. The fronts reach Western states 24 to 48 hours prior to their arrival in the Midwest; they reach the East 24 to 48 hours later.
November 2: As November arrives, frost often moves well into the Border States, and the odds increase for cold throughout the week ahead. The 3rd ushers in the snow season for the central states, flurries or accumulation becoming at least a ten percent possibility per day between that date and spring. Chances for a thunderstorm
disappear until February in the lower Midwest, but all-day rains increase. On the other hand, if this first November front is a day or two late, the 1st through the 3rd or 4th can be some of the mildest days of late autumn.
November 6: This weather system usually brings the coldest days of November’s first week. It also carries Middle Fall into the Border States and the South, Late Fall to the Midwest and southern Plains, and Early Winter to farms along the Canadian border. The days immediately after the November 6th front are usually much more moderate, but precipitation is the rule as the next system approaches. Beginning at this time of month, the percentage of daily sunlight drops quickly, and the wind blows a little harder, rising to its winter levels.
November 11: Sun generally follows this front, and the 11th through the 13th are often some of the best days in the first half of the month for harvest. A dramatic increase in the number of freezing predawn temperatures starts with this system, the lows below 32 growing from a frequency average of 40 percent up to 70 percent across the nation’s midsection.
November 16: As this front approaches, expect milder conditions, but an increased chance for rain or snow. Although the November 16th system can be relatively gentle, sometimes it brings highs only in the teens or even 20s as far south as Kentucky. After the front moves through, favorable harvest conditions typically follow: the 18th is one of the drier November days in the Midwest, the 17th in the Plains, the 19th in the East.
November 20: The cycle of the November 20th weather system causes milder conditions before its arrival and increased chances for precipitation. This is a front that carries up to two or more inches of snow across the northern states four years in a decade. After the system comes through, it can be followed by temperatures in single digits throughout the North, and a hard freeze deep into the South.
November 24: This sixth cold front of the month, arriving around the 24th, often brings rain or significant snowfall on the 23rd. After the 25th, the percentage of cloudy days almost doubles over the average for the rest of November; even in the South, cloudy days begin to increase the likelihood for seasonal affective disorders and contribute to complications with harvest. This weather system marks the decline of average highs below 50 degrees and the end to any reasonable chance of a day above 70 throughout the lower Midwest and Mid-Atlantic states. Average low temperatures fall below freezing in almost all of the northern and central states.
November 28: The seventh high-pressure system of November generally arrives around the 28th, preceded by rain or snow three years out of four. This is one of the most dangerous weather systems of the month, and precipitation lingers through the cold for the 29th and 30th. Clouds, of course, dominate the sky, and travel conditions are typically uncertain. Low temperatures throughout the northern and central regions of the United States can fall below zero between this front and the March equinox front. Conditions do ordinarily moderate on the last day of November, setting the stage for an early December thaw.
THE ALMANACK DAYBOOK
November 1: The period of November 1 through the 7 is the warmest time of the month, and the often the driest. Transplant perennials, shrubs and trees. Cut your wood, fit storm windows, gather wildflowers for winter bouquets, and harvest corn and soybeans before the late autumn rains begin.
November 2: The Second Spring Moon enters its second quarter, its weakest position during the first part of November, favoring work with livestock, pets, friends and family. The weak moon is also recommended for surgery and dental work on livestock and people.
November 3: Indoors, mature aloe plants often send up flower spikes indoors. Outside, ginkgo, magnolia, and white mulberry leaves can fall within a few hours. Falling leaves let you know that it is time to fertilize the pasture and garden. Manure and compost that is spread now will have a chance to work its way into the ground all winter. In the South, plant winter grains and vegetables that bear their fruit above the ground under the waxing moon. Order legume seed for winter pastures. Start all your bedding plants under lights to get a head start on spring.
November 4: Radical shifts of temperature associated with late November high-pressure systems have been linked to lambing sickness, hypocalcaemia or a sudden calcium deficiency in sheep. Since weather affects all mammals, it makes sense pay attention to the effect of cold waves on your own health and that of your children!
November 5: Parsley and thyme should be brought inside in pots for winter seasonings. Outside, wrap young transplants to protect them against frost cracking.
November 6: Daylight Savings Time ends today at 2:00 a.m. Be ready for animals and family members to be out-of-sorts because of the change in their schedule. Try eating and feeding up to an hour earlier in order to soften the transition.
November 7: Seasonal affective disorders may be increasing in many people due to the change in sunset time that accompanies the end of Daylight Savings Time. Even though you are getting up when it is lighter outside, the sudden end to the day near suppertime can be pretty upsetting.
November 8: Drench your flock for winter. Vaccinate late lambs for enterotoxemia a week or so before offering them grain feed. Treat sheep for mites and lice as you make the final move from pasture to winter quarters. And from today through the 20th is the normal rutting period for whitetail deer in the central part of the country. Be alert: Sheep, goats, and even cattle become deer when buck fever strikes weekend hunters.
November 9: Grazing ordinarily comes to a close in Midwestern pastures as the ground temperature approaches 40 degrees. Strawberries can now be mulched with straw. Fertilize trees after their leaves have fallen. Schedule your frost-seeding for January and February. Deep water all perennials before the ground freezes, especially if your garden suffered from the drought this summer.
November 10: Today is full moon day for the Second Spring Moon. Expect the November 11 cold front to be especially fierce because of lunar influence, bringing early frost to the South and snow to the North.
November 11: Thin the woodlot and fencerows as the moon wanes, but leave plenty of shade for your animals. Deep water all perennials before the ground freezes, especially if your garden suffered from the drought this summer.
November 12: Compensating for the lack of blooming flowers and green leaves are the pale champagnes of the field grass and goldenrod, the russets of the Japanese knotweed, the red honeysuckle berries and red rose hips, the white sycamore bark, and the purple raspberry stalks.
November 13: As the weather becomes colder, separate your thinnest pregnant livestock and give them a little extra attention in order to improve their condition and reduce risk of abortion.
November 14: As harvest in the field and garden comes to an end, tie up all the loose ends of the year before the Christmas holidays begin. Even if you live in an apartment, try to do some year-end cleaning and organization now. Since depression and the winter blues are becoming more common, late November is a favorable time to start a winter exercise program. A gentle routine of low-impact exercises improves both mental and physical health.
November 15: Feed the lawn and pasture: fall is a better time than spring - the winter's rain and snow, freezing and thawing, will gently work the fertilizer through the soil. Mulch the wet perennial beds to prevent drying and cold damage.
November 16: Along the West Coast, the annual crab harvest season is underway. In Louisiana, crawdads move into flooded rice fields to feed on the remnants of that crop. Plan harvest and marketing of mistletoe after leafdrop.
November 17: Remnants of garden hostas have dissolved into the mulch. Artichoke leaves are twisted and stiff. Some Osage fruit is developing blackish patches, a sign of the approach of December. Throughout the weeks ahead, the landscape becomes browner as fallen foliage settles and comes apart.
November 18: The Second Spring Moon enters its final quarter today, making the week ahead an excellent lunar time for completing harvest and cleaning up the garden.
November 19: Harvest corn and soybeans, cut your dogs’ nails, trim hair on goats, slaughter livestock, give vaccinations, and treat animals for internal and external parasites under the waning moon. Late bulbs, garlic, shrubs, and trees can be planted in Late Fall throughout much of the nation as the moon is waning. Also during this time, bring in oregano, rosemary, parsley, and thyme for winter seasonings. Stake weaker shrubs and trees. Water paperwhites, daffodils, tulips, crocus, and amaryllis in pots for solstice bloom.
Fertilize pastures for improved winter hardiness and stimulation of growth in early spring. Apply a top dressing of lime to obtain a pasture pH of 6.0 to 6.8.
November 20: If you have goats, now is the time to be building kidding boxes and a holding box for disbudding kids, time for completing fall vaccinations and for trimming feet. If you are treating your herd for mites, get all the goats at once - since mites are contagious.
November 21: When the moon turns new on the 24th, put in the first of your bedding plants for spring.
November 22: Most of the lilac and forsythia leaves are down. Only the Japanese honeysuckle and the bamboo leaves remain green. Hydrangea flowers are pale and brittle.
November 23: Put your marketing plan in place for holiday honey sales. Many beekeepers find that demand for honey is highest between Thanksgiving and Christmas.
November 24: Tomorrow’s new moon is likely to intensify the November 24 cold front. Expect rainstorms along the West Coast and traffic delays in the East from snow.
November 25: The Sandhill Crane Migration Moon is new today, favorable for planting garlic and greens across the South, and for digging in the last of the tulips and daffodils in the nation’s midsection.
November 26: Average low temperatures fall below freezing in almost all of the northern and central states.
November 27: Work gypsum into the soil where salt, used to melt winter's ice, may damage plantings.
November 28: Across the southern half of the United States, treat pets for fleas and ticks for the last time this year.
November 29: From this point forward, growth, even among the winter plants like purple deadnettle, ground ivy, dock and dandelions, is almost imperceptible, and the cold does away with all their November progress.
November 30: Fertility in mammals, especially those that have had trouble conceiving earlier in the fall, tends to rise as early winter approaches. Their bodies may know that now will be the last best chance to produce offspring to be born in the year’s milder months.
ALMANACK LITERATURE
The Troublesome Burl
A True Story
By Elias Keim, Ashland, Ohio
When my dad was a boy in the mid 1920s, money was tight, and if he wanted any spending money, he had to earn it himself. At that time, crows were very plentiful, and the local courthouse paid a bounty of 25 cents each for every crow head that was brought in. That was a lot of money for a boy at that time, and dad was willing to put in a lot of effort in his relentless hunt or search for crows.
One evening when the day’s farm work was done, he left for a woods twelve miles distant where he had earlier sported a nest. The nest was way up close to the top of a very tall tree that didn’t have any branches except at the upper part. The only way he had to get up was to shin (at which he was well practiced), but this tree was exceptional, and he barely made it up 50 feet to the first branch when his strength gave out.
He rested a while on this branch before he attempted the next part. Up to the next branch was only ten feet, but there was a large burl growing on the trunk between these two branches. For a while he thought he wouldn’t be able to pass this barrier, as it was so large he couldn’t get his arms around it to shin up past it. Finally, he discovered a crack on top of the burl that he could insert his fingers well enough into to pull himself up. After passing this, he was soon at the nest, which had four young crows.
As he started back down and wanted to pass that burl, however, he discovered he couldn’t do it without losing his hold, as he couldn’t swing his legs around the trunk because the burl was too large. After numerous attempts, and coming close to losing his grip, he went back up on the next branch to think it over and decide on the best way to get out of his predicament.
His situation looked gloomy. Here he was deep in a large woods all alone, and miles from hearing distance to anybody. He hadn’t said anything about where he was going (his parents were used to his jaunts and hadn’t asked where he was going), and he knew it was hopeless to think anybody would find him within even few days, unless it would just so happen. And to think of spending the night sitting on that branch 60 feet above the ground was not appealing either. Suppose he would nod off to sleep, lose his balance and tumble to the ground?
Finally, he decided he must take a chance and do it quickly. Dusk was already stealing into the woodland. Ten feet below, right in line with the branch he was sitting on was another branch, and from there it was 50 feet clear all the way to the ground. He didn’t dawdle around or hesitate long. He let himself drop and caught at the branch ten feet below him in a truly life and death grip as his body was hurtling past. His skill an strength as a woodsman served him well in this dire time of need, and his fall was stopped. He swung himself up on that branch to rest a little and regain his composure, and then he quickly shinned the rest of the way down.
Without a doubt, he offered many a true offering of thanks to his Caretaker above on the way home. Being thankful for such should even reach to me, for should Dad have missed that branch, I would probably not be here today.
THE NOVEMBER SCKRAMBLER
In the Sckrambler puzzle, unsckramble as many of the words as you can; some of the words may contain typos, so be ready to be creative. Send your answers on a postcard to Poor Will, P.O. Box 431, Yellow Springs, OH 45387 postmarked between November 1 and November 30, 2011 (ONLY MATERIAL MAILED BETWEEN THOSE DATES WILL BE ACCEPTED FOR THE NOVEMBER PRIZE). Entries with correct solutions received during those four weeks will be mixed up in a tub, and one entry will be chosen at random by a blindfolded Poor Will. The winner will receive a $10.00 check by January 1, 2012.
NIWETR
OOTBS
EEECLF
EABLNKT
INGDDSLE
ELEST
OWNS
LLBWNSOA
IIESLCC
SLATSYRC
SSHYLU
VELOHS
EDLS
SSIK
OOAGTBGN
ECI
SFRTO
DLOC
DOLUCY
ZAILBDRAZ
UNBDEL
GLENJI
TMITNSE
SEASONAL UPS AND DOWNS
The other day, I went to the post office to mail a letter, and the woman in front of me looked at my name on the upper left hand corner of the envelope and asked: “Are you the one who writes the almanacs?”
I admitted I was, and she responded that she couldn't stand my column anymore - it depressed her to read about summer ending.
The person who cut my hair a week later expressed the same sentiment. “It seems like summer just got here,” he told me.
I tried to explain how next spring was approaching underneath the breakdown of this summer, how certain May flowers were sprouting their new leaves now, but he was unmoved by my data.
“I guess you could look at things that way,” he said skeptically, but she found no consolation in such a view. I commiserated that the end of summer always brought me a little sadness, too.
My diaries, in fact, have shown me over the years how much my state of mind is altered by the time of year. At first I believed that the repeating pattern of my private journal entries was simply a sign that I was failing miserably at growing up. I saw my annual cycles of optimism and depression as indicative of the inability to develop stability.
But my habit of nature observation and my recent readings about the body's natural rhythms have convinced me that my mood swings are due at least as much to meteorological instability as to an arrested emotional development.
Placing personal and nature diaries side by side, I can come up with a rough outline of my seasonal trajectory:
• Late August through Middle October: Emotional high, a surge of autumn energy and determination
• Late October through November: Gradual breakdown of optimism
• Late November through December: Preoccupation with the Christmas season - sometimes positive, sometimes negative
• Late December through the First Week of February: A welcome period of winter stability
• February through March: Depression, breakdown of winter equilibrium, difficult adjustment to the expectations of spring
• April through Mid June: Strong mood swings, sometimes as violent as the changes taking place in the landscape
• Late June through July: A time of relative stability similar to that experienced in the middle of winter.
• Late July into early August: Nostalgia for the end of summer, transition to an increase in energy
Whether this list is the description of random personal neurosis or of actual interaction with the world is hard to say. Still, the more I observe myself here in this place, the more I feel attuned to both where and who I think I am. Gradually, I am coming to the conclusion that I am not as autonomous as I would like to believe, and I am realizing that watching the world will tell me as much about myself as introspection.