A long, cold winter?

It was dusk when I walked outside and I felt it. I don't know exactly what "it" is, except that it is that indefinable something that says, "Summer's over. Fall's here."

It is a truly indefinable thing here in Tennessee. The leaves aren't turning yet. The tomatoes are still producing like crazy. The only clue to the changing of the seasons are the temperature swings in the past week or so: upper '80's one day and barely in the '70's the next. Yet it feels as if everything is preparing to gear down for the year.

I'm wondering if it will be a hard winter this year. I'm not one of those folks who go around looking for wooly worms to see how they're colored (black: hard winter, brown: light) or count the number of fogs in August see how many snows we'll get but still, I've noticed some things. The cats' coats seem to be coming in thicker than usual and tonight there were the geese.

Every year, the Canadian geese that summer here start flying to their winter grounds. Usually, there are several little groups that fly over - little v's of five or so geese. As I stood outside at dusk, I watched four waves of at least twenty geese flew right over my head and two more groups flew off in a different direction. Like I said, it makes me wonder.