Accepting the Inevitable

I resisted.

I denied.

I procrastinated.

I sang:  

Then I accepted. Then succumbed.

I turned on the heat.  The house is just too cold in the mornings. I had to do it.

Summer is over. Time to shift the sandals to the back of the closet and wear socks and tights.  Time to collect my grandmother’s fur coat from its frozen storage, make soups, replace the thin cotton blanket with the goose down duvet, deadhead the herbs, keep a pair of gloves in my pocketbook, and swap my t-shirts for sweaters.

That’s what I hate the most. Living in the northeast, I love the change in seasons. I just don’t like preparing for them. My closet and dresser are too small to hold all my sweaters year round so by late spring every year I fold them into old suitcases, scatter cedar blocks and lavender sachets on top, and store them in the attic.

Now it’s time to retrieve them.

Each year, though I try to cull a few I didn’t wear last season, I can’t throw out the ones that I knit, or my mother knit. I’ve tossed an item only to wonder where it went and suddenly need it.  So I tend to keep them all. Those that don’t make it into my dresser drawer go in boxes under the bed and in dressers in other rooms.  I’m lucky if I remember where they are.

Some of my hand-knits seeking drawer space

And that doesn’t stop me from buying and knitting more.  Colors and textures; jackets, pullovers, cardigans and vests.  I try to wear them, but most rooms are usually too hot for me.

Maybe I should keep my t-shirts out.

The heat’s on, but the windows are open.