The sprinklers have been blown out. Lawn furniture, outdoor mats, and flower pots all stowed for the winter. The garden is cleaned out and garlic is planted. Now we wait.
One morning, there’s a dusting of white on the hills down the east valley. I pull on long pants instead of Capris, socks and shoes rather than flip flops. Stuff’s getting real.
We go for a drive, one sunny afternoon, up into the grasslands looking for fall colour but we’re too late. It’s stick season here. We see patches of icy white on the side of the rough road.
I make soup, and we enjoy hot cups of it over games of chess. The furnace hums songs of comfort. We don hoodies rather than short-sleeved t-shirts more often. I put a tiny shirt on Maya when we go out.
The liminality of these days invites us to pause. To reflect. Winter is coming and one day it will blow in with a fury, but for now we enjoy the opportunity to wait. To abide.
To be present.
To be.

Beautiful photo … and your description is so evocative of this time. I have always loved the word ‘liminal’ ever since I came across it some years ago: those inbetween times and spaces in our lives have a quality all their own, rich in possibility and yet nothing yet formed. We are still in late autumn colour here, but our ‘stick season’ is not far away.
Liminal is one of my favourite words too.