A cold morning here . . . 36 degrees, with warnings of patchy frost, though I doubt we'll be the first in town to get it, given how close we are to the cove. I haven't turned on the furnace yet, but that time is coming soon.

Paul had yesterday off from work, so after I finished editing, we went down to the Fore River Preserve and walked along the old canal, which has now returned to salt marsh and tidal creeks. It was a gusty day, cool and bright, with the red leaves rattling in the breeze, and we were in high spirits, noses to the wind like hunting dogs. He is good company, my boy: easy and kind, and funny and high-strung, and in love with the earth.

Then we came home and listened to all of our baseball teams lose, and ate oven-fried chicken for dinner, and then the three of us sat on the couch under a blanket and drank hot cider.

In the meantime, the White House is imploding, terrorists are plotting against a sitting governor, and--good news--the poet Louise Gluck wins a Nobel.

I also had a small bit of good news yesterday: the Maine Review nominated my poem "In Praise of Boring Sex" for the Best of the Net anthology. I've received a couple of Pushcart nominations in the past, but never this one. So I'm pleased . . . especially given how hard it was to publish that piece.

Today: yoga and editing, tomatoes to cook down, trash to drag to the curb, America to treasure . . . the real America, our homeland, grand continent between the seas, beautiful and flawed. Which is to say: vote.