Friday, October 14, 2016

Autumn & Frost

Well, this past week I've had to scrape a light frost from the car windows two times prior to being able to leaving home for an early appointment and work. I love the cool crisp weather but do not love frost (or ice when winter arrives). I have rheumatoid arthritis that does not like cold weather either, but I deal with it. The hardest part is trying to scrape my windows. I'm not the tallest person on earth by any means...just average, and I drive an SUV because I am not comfortable in lower riding vehicles. It's easier for me to slide in and out of my RAV4, and even then if John's driving I have a little trouble because of arthritis in my left hip climbing into the passenger seat.

But I love New England and am not ready to leave yet. The trees are still in the process of changing colors here, although yesterday I noticed a lot of leaves falling. There is a maple tree at the bottom of Irene Drive as I'm leaving my neighborhood that has gorgeous red-orange leaves. It's like a pillar of flame before me as I descend the mountain and just gives me a visceral thrill. Nothing is as majestic as a maple tree with fiery leaves illuminated by the first rays of morning light coming over the top of the mountain.

Kelly is excited because it's Pumpkin Patch time at the CT Trolley Museum. On Sunday she'll be a motorman delivering trolley cars full of children to the pumpkin patch where they can climb out, run into the field and choose a pumpkin they then can take back to the visitor center to decorate if they want to and then take home. She's always been great with kids and they love her because she's one of those people who, at 25-years old, looks like she's thirteen. She loves it when the kids run up to her in her uniform and give her spontaneous hugs and big grins and thank her for the trolley ride. But last night she put the finishing touches on a report complete with photo documentation of the restoration work done on car 169, the oldest trolley in the museum's collection. This project is her baby. She's been working on the car since 2012 and is proud of the work they've done so far replacing support structures and rotted wood panels, and building new platforms at either end. She'll turn her report in tomorrow where it'll be placed in the binder for that trolley car as a record of the restoration work to date. It's a ten-year project, so six more years to go before 169 will be ready to be displayed.

It's a lovely time of year for a trolley ride! (It's also Rails to the Dark Side time!)

Meanwhile, I've been working on the sequel to Black King Takes White Queen. It's about half written. Last night I submitted a Halloween story, You Can't Go Home Again, to Saugus.net's annual Halloween story contest. This year's entry is a more traditional Halloween story. I'm also thinking about my NaNoWriMo novel. It's nearly mid-way through October already! During the entire month of November I'll be writing a contemporary novel based on a Christmas novella I wrote, The Winter Solstice Ball. The setting is an old grand resort hotel on the coast of Maine. There'll be some romance in the story and may include the holiday ball from the novella. We'll see what happens when I start writing because I never know until things get rolling where the story's going to go.

Happy Autumn!




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