I was not prepared.  I am never quite prepared for the realization that late fall is setting in, that the songbirds flying at night and the flocks of geese throughout the day heading for southern climes is a solid manifestation of nature's design from mild to malign, though some may not quite it that way.  Malign, in my estimation, because of the death of so many beautiful plants.  Not those flora that are accustomed as plants and trees native to the geology and elements of our climate, but those which we introduce and are too tender to withstand frosts.

We view our gardens daily, and appreciate their display, their architecture, colour, variations, textures and fragrance, beckoning the eye to feast on all of that beauty.  And then, suddenly, all it takes is one night's deep frost and wind, and the following morning they are gone, all of them, colours disappeared, shape and form dissolved as their molecules turn from life-giving moisture to death-delivering crystallization.

And so, with sorrow I must acknowledge the inevitable; emotionally unprepared but logical to the reality of what a lifetime of observation has exposed me to, of which I have been a witness.  True, we do celebrate all of our seasons, for each brings a beauty of its own.  But the nostalgia that autumn specializes in as we watched leaves that have turned crimson, gold, russet, spiral off trees and sprinkle themselves liberally on the ground, remind us of universal entropy and the evolution of revolution from season to season, death and rebirth.

As I moved to the refrigerated fresh juices shelves there was an older couple in conversation; he, looking more worn that his wife was closely examining the sale ticket beside the "not from concentrate" orange juice, a product I too was interested in.  From our common interest we were propelled into a three-way conversation revolving around products and their relative qualities and from there to the inescapable fact of getting on with life as one ages.

He had plenty to say from his vantage point of 85 years of living and our conversation explored the philosophy behind the very practical results of keeping fit, of physically exercising one's body and maintaining a keen interest in the world around us.  He did not appear particularly fit but having attained 85 years of age is no inconsiderable feat in and of itself. 

However, in light of this country's growing aging population and medical science learning and advancing in various techniques in how to prolong life and the quality of life, a fairly good indication of what society in general will be looking like in the future.

When, at the check-out counter, I packed all that I had bought into the three black plastic containers we have used for that purpose for well over a decade, I transferred them with some physical effort to the shopping buggy to be wheeled outside to the car where my husband was waiting in the parking lot with our lone little dog who takes exception to being left alone. 

Juts as I was lifting the third and heaviest of the crates, someone appeared at my elbow, and gently took the authority of possession from my arms, swiftly depositing the heavy crate into the waiting cart.  I looked up to see a tall, fit man of roughly 50, who had taken the initiative to give a moment's assistance to a woman of gentle age, and thanked him for his thoughtful kindness.

When our daughter was born, over 51 years ago, Branson General Hospital in Toronto where our then-doctor had hospital rights, was not a teaching hospital, and at the time of my admission there were no doctors on staff or being taught the practise of their profession.  In the Labour room I was examined by a nurse whose opinion it was that I was a long, long way from delivering, though this was a second birth.

It didn't take long before I sent my husband, who was with me, giving me ample emotional support and encouragement, to desperately seek out the nurse, to inform her that delivery was imminent.  She felt otherwise, and though she had contacted my doctor, he had simply rolled over in bed. 

The next thing I knew in my delirium, I was looking up at the green-mask-covered face of a doctor in scrubs who was assisting the nurse in moving me onto a delivery-room bed and then speedily whisked me there, where our daughter was born.  That 'doctor' happened to be my husband whom the nurse had delegated to assist, as she was the only nurse on duty that night.

Mine was an otherwise normal birth, despite my trepidation and pain.  Unlike the breech birth of an underweight baby born in an Ottawa jail cell late last month. 

Julie Bilotta, 26-years old, in custody at the Ottawa-Carleton Detention Centre, whose hours-long agony in childbirth appeals were ignored by guards and by nurses on duty there, gave birth with the help of paramedics who were called when the baby's feet emerged, delivering her baby in a jail cell.

When we were young, very young, in our mid-teens, music played an important part in our social life, as it does now with young people although the kind of music and its quality to our elderly ears has been much degraded from the romantic, sometimes wistful and always lyrical music we heard back in the mid-1950s.  We danced to graceful music that captured the zeitgeist of our times.

That remains a constant; young people listening to the kinds of music that has some meaning to them.  Popular music of today seems bereft of the gentle romantic and focuses on casual sex and on the violence of the streets unencumbered in the minds of musical thugs by any vestige of social grace, of law and of order in society.  But of course, mine is a very age-opinionated view.

In our teen years the Broadway musical Kismet became a celebrated hit.  And the music mesmerized me, particularly the song "Stranger in Paradise".  It became 'our' song, the music that exemplified for us our growing relationship of emotional intimacy.

We learned eventually that the music was taken from a far more elderly classical source, the Polovtsian Dances from Prince Igor, by the incomparable (of exotic seeming music from the Russian steppes and the near East) Russian composer Alexander Borodin, and completed after his death by Nikolai Rimski-Korsakov and Alexander Glazunov, which enjoyed its first public performance in 1890.





The music that so enthralled us was first introduced to a Broadway stage in 1953, and later again in 1955, the year we were married, at age 18.  Lately, we have been hearing on the public airways recordings of that time and that music and it recalls memories nestled deep in our consciousness, never to be mislaid.

Yesterday one of our friends and neighbours unburdened his feelings to us about the manner in which some of our mutual neighbours react to one another.  Uncivilly, to say the very least.  Although, generally speaking, this is a street where many people know one another and acknowledge one another as neighbours and valued personal contacts to whom they express sympathy when it is required, congratulations when that is appropriate there are some among us who shun their neighbours.

One mightn't think that living directly beside others for over two decades would result in such cold indifference, but with some people this is exactly the prevailing attitude.  Our good neighbour bemoaned the fact that despite their properties touching and their long propinquity, the family living directly beside us, sandwiched between his house and ours, is comprised of insular and moody people who go out of their way to avoid acknowledging the presence of others.

When emerging from his house and he encounters the man of the house, or sees him while walking on the street, this neighbour will go to extremes to avoid coming face to face with someone he has lived beside for over twenty years.  Sometimes averting his face is not enough; overtly crossing the street to ensure their paths do not cross directly is also employed.  And when he sees the son, now 18, jogging on the street and he pleasantly greets him the son too turns his face away, expressionless, without a sound, obviously emulating his father.

That he is speaking of a man who will go to great lengths not to encounter another human being in his hermetic mindset that embraces social insularity, someone who would never come to the aid of another person, someone who would not offer a $1 tool to a neighbour, is well enough known to the entire street.  That dour, miserable countenance is one his own wife has become familiar with in the most intimate of ways, and the paradox is that she is a bright, outgoing personality, swift to smile and greet and befriend others.  That she has been able to live with this controlling, civil-averse man for so many years is the true mystery.

We commiserated with our neighbour, emphasized that it was nothing personal directed toward him, that this attitude that he deplores that one he comes up against constantly is experienced by others as well; reminding him that he has other neighbours upon he can rely for friendly support.  But this is a man who affably greets strangers because he has an open and friendly character, and it is difficult for him to separate another person's mean social temperament from a personal affront against himself.

In the same token, on a personal scale, I think often how needed it is for us to affirm to those among whom we live our appreciation of their presence.  For women in particular, I feel that other women should make an effort to express their admiration of them and support of them.  Little compliments go a long way to helping other people feel better about themselves and how they are perceived by others. 

And it requires little effort on our part to extend those modest enough expressions of appreciation.

Yesterday was bright and beautiful, albeit cool; it is, after all, fall, and we had overnight frost the night before.  A perfect time to begin the long, incremental shutting down of the gardens, preparing everything for the arrival of winter.  I had, at my disposal, large compostable bags and shears and seqateurs to begin cutting back perennials and bagging the results.  Our composters are used mostly for kitchen waste, not so much garden detritus, which is carted away weekly by the municipality for a gigantic compost heap, which residents are able to avail themselves of, during the growing season.

After three bagsful of garden cuttings I was beginning to warm up nicely inside my fleece-lined jacket, but it was time to get back into the house and begin dinner preparations.  The first of which was the baking of the traditional pumpkin pie.  My husband thought he might like a crumb crust for the pie for a change and I agreed; crumb crust it was.  I had some misgivings when I poured the pumpkin pie filling into the crust which I'd pre-baked, but in the end it came out very well; the crust seemed to integrate itself into the spicy pudding-like quality of the pie.  I'd used two eggs and a cup of 10% cream and the pie did seem different this year.

I suppose baking a squash was a bit of overkill in that department, but it was delicious, alongside the tender turkey and tiny whole potatoes.  I've enough turkey left over from that small turkey, to bake at least four to five turkey pot pies that I will freeze for use later on.  We seem to be the few in our family who are not vegetarians.  My brother and his daughter, my sister and her son, our daughter and granddaughter, our youngest son are all vegetarians.

On our ravine walk while the turkey was roasting in the oven, we came across a ravine-walking acquaintance accompanied by his wife, their daughter and son-in-law, and four pre-teen grandchildren, a picture of family togetherness.

People - many people, that is - have a tendency to get on with their lives.  I've an old girlfriend whom I haven't seen in sixty years, someone with whom I went to high school, and with whom our relationship extended until that time when we were still young, but dating and close to marriage; events that took place at a much earlier time in the chronology of our lives than now occurs.

We rejoined our relationship remotely, though we have lived in different cities for quite a long time.  By happenstance my sister was befriended by this very old friend of mine, who enquired whether we were related.  When my sister informed me of that coincidence she also gave me the email address of my old friend (though my sister, legally blind, is not computer-literate) and from then on, over the past five years or so we have kept in touch through that medium.

A few days ago my old friend forwarded to me (although I had received on previous occasions similar photographs from her) the latest photos of herself posed alongside her boyfriend, with whom she has been enjoying a deep relationship for the past nine years.  They are preparing, once again, to embark on their usual winter-long trek to Florida.  They live separately, not together, but see one another several times weekly, and attend social events together.

In the photographs they look extremely happy and satisfied with life.  My friend is 74 years of age, and her beau is 88, looking quite as fit and prepared to enjoy life as she does, both obviously prepared for as prolonged a period as possible.