Giving Thanks - waiting for the new town to arrive

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Again - I fly out the end of a storm of contrasts.

Tuesday - a screaming nor'easter, straight off the ocean.  My surrogate older sister, Mia, up in Temple, is hit with 5" of snow on her deck.  Driving in the mountains is slick icy and deadly.  Flood warnings for everyplace else.

Here in town - torrential, blistering wind-driven rain.  Horizontal, coming in from the bay.  Flags, both in front of the hospital and the hotels, all snapping loud as Orson Welles' braces. 

Flood watches everywhere it's not snowing.

Wednesday - suddenly clear, sunny and cold.  A lovely sunrise greeted my preparations for going in to work - I was off by the time the sun set.

Thursday - Thanksgiving.  All the leaves are gone.

I've noticed this oddity before, never seen it in process.  Trees are a riot of colors, leaves blowing everywhere and suddenly they are all done, piles of crinkly colors underfoot.  Branches are bare - and before you know it, nothing is underfoot.  

The ground is clear as if a giant vacuum cleaner has sucked up the last of Fall and taken it to some strange hidden trashbin.

The ground is stark, the outline of the land and buildings is clear in a way you've not seen before.  In one way it's very sere, very empty.  But it's also very easy on the eyes, you can see what things look like, unclothed until the snows fly and cover it all with a blanket of variable white.

I admit that I have always liked this time of year.  You see three or four different worlds change around you as time goes by.  

The rich greens of late Summer.  The fading glory of the start of Fall and it's glorious later explosion.  Then the strange ending of the season, leaves mostly on the ground, defiant stragglers still clinging to their Summer places.

Finally - at some point, early on or later near Thanksgiving, a storm will come and ruthlessly strip them off, leaving stark trees, as if drawn by God's own steel-tipped pen.  

And that leaves us where we are, right now.  This strange, pregnant pause before plunging into the cold embrace of Winter.  The snows will come, soon; the ground lays waiting with outstretched arms to welcome the intimate closeness of a lover.

Here we are, waiting with empty fields, shopping malls parking lots, scarves on necks, layers of coats and cups of coffee, waiting for the next city to come, white and sere, cold and rich.

The next city to come.