Oops! How is it possible? Symbolic of not the years that have passed necessarily, but the years that have brought us to our mid-80s? Another two months and I'll hit 84. My memory is secure as are my thought processes. Or so I felt. Last night, speaking to our younger son, I had one of those 'oh, no!' moments, when I said to him, 'you're kidding...?'

That was when he said his older brother is turning 61 in several weeks' time, not 60 as we'd assumed. Why did we assume? Hmmm, memory. As for our younger son, he'll be 58 in several days when his birth date arrives, and his sister falls right in between. How is it possible for parents to forget how old their children are? Mind, we do have problems keeping track of our own birthdays. But we think we've got it down right, now.

Birthdays, fleeting time. Disbelief. That's life.

So it taking care that we don't miss daily appointments with destiny. We are destined to emerge from our comfortable home daily to take two little dogs for a walk. Two little dogs we were convinced were reaching their 5th year. Then to discover they're really six years old now, having consulted their papers. Something about age that doesn't quite sit right with us?

Today's another of those in-between fall days. We've been treated to sun, cool temperatures and plenty of wind. We'd gone out early this morning, leaving two little dogs on their desperate own. The piteous groans and whining, the cries for rescue from the horrible thought of being left alone for an hour, deserted, orphaned, the world coming to an abrupt end.

And then, on our return, leaping with relief at us that nothing horrible occurred to take us away from them forever. Leaving them alone in a suddenly-cold, alienated environment. Gone, their source of food, a tragedy upon a disaster. Oh, the joy when two little snouts searched anxiously through the groceries for signs of a cauliflower or two and discovering their presence. Reward time!

In the ravine soon after breakfast, the wind howled through the forest canopy, swaying treetops, flicking dried foliage off the only home they've known since their spring birth. Even leaves want the security of comfort and shelter, and now their trees have abandoned them. True, they've been dressed in lovely costumes for the occasion, but there they are, adrift on an ocean of other discarded leaves, left to their own devices, to wither and shrivel and become compost for the forest rebirth cycle.

We saw a tiny  apple that had fallen into the crotch of a very old wild apple tree. So, discarded, it failed to venture very far from its home berth. And the woodland fall asters despite the cold are holding their own, dominating the forest floor with their undistinguished floral presence. The larger, more attractive asters have suffered a setback on the other hand, with pounding rain of the past several days serving to give them an entirely dishevelled look from which they may never recover; they haven't the rebound qualities of their scruffier counterparts.

We passed a huge old pine at the bottom of one of the hills, with its massive three leaders. Hammered on to one of those leaders at some time in the wistfully dim past area children -- when the area was still farmland adjoining the ravine -- were two small boards, to enable them to find foot- and hand-holds to ease their way onto the upper branches of a then-immature tree. The pine has over the years grown to an enormous size and taken those two boards up with them and they sit now at a lofty height that even the nimblest of sturdy youngsters could not reach.

Our daily trek over, we returned home, ambled down the street out of the forest environs, to begin another part of our day, Jackie and Jillie satisfied that they enjoyed another day's ramble in the woods. I've planned a hearty lentil-tomato soup for dinner, to be paired with a spicy-cheesy flatbread I'll try out for the first time with bread dough I've prepared, and my husband has gone out to mow the lawn....