It seems surreal to be sitting in my house on November 8th with all the windows open and the furnace off. And yes, I know what you’re thinking: why am I inside and not out there enjoying all of it? Oh, I have been — trust me. The boys and I went for a 3 1/2 hour walk through a nearby state park, walking the trails and doing boy things like digging in the stream and finding cool rocks. Imagine my shock when I reached into the stream and pulled out this little gem:
It’s an arrowhead! I couldn’t believe my luck, for it was sitting right on top of a gravely part of the stream as if it had just been dropped yesterday. A quick search of the ‘net tells me this is a “Fresno” type arrowhead; I am thrilled beyond belief. When I first moved into this house, I found a partial arrowhead while tilling up a flower garden, and I have always been disappointed that I couldn’t find an intact one. Well, today’s my day, apparently. The boys were so excited that after we ate lunch back at the house, they wanted to go back to the park and walk the trails again. How could I say no on this beautiful day? Knowing full well that the snow may fly in a matter of days, I loaded them back up and we walked the trails again.
I tell ya — after the monster winter that we had last year, it’s such a relief to have the snow hold off, if only for a couple more weeks. I think James Lileks described this weird weather the best: “it’s as if Nature dropped the weeks on the floor and is putting them back in random order.” We began October with the threat of real snowfall, and the look of resignation on my fellow Iowans’ faces was almost too much. Another winter like this! Can we stand it? Then things started looking up from there. Now we have 72 degree perfection in November, and by this point the farmers are doing happy jigs every time they read the daily forecast. So, so strange.
On the plus side, I started Christmas shopping — online, that is. Every year I do more shopping online, partly because of time constraints (I have a 40 min. drive to a mid-sized town with multiple stores, and my boys do not have the patience for such a shopping excursion), but also because I. Hate. Crowds. Sure, there are good sales in the brick and mortar stores, but either I get more impatient with crowds as I age or people just get more clueless and rude.
I’m guessing it’s the latter.
