The temperatures are dropping precipitously this week . . . down into the 20s tonight, the teens tomorrow night. The winter garden is still producing kale, collards, arugula, cilantro, and a few other hardy herbs, but time is running out. I feel lucky to have had them for this long--almost Thanksgiving, and still eating fresh salads. I wish I had a little greenhouse so I could keep them going all winter long, but that's not likely to happen. Too many other renovations on the list.

Today: editing, vacuuming, going to the dentist . . . it will be that kind of day. I'd like to take a walk, if the hours allow. I feel a melancholy slipping over me. I suppose it's a winter sadness, this slow floating into the holiday season, when normally I would be planning to travel to see family or to pick up a son at school, planning to figure out how to cram my tiny dining room with chairs. I don't always love the crush of the holidays, but the thought of my older son, alone in Chicago, is painful.

Every day, the virus creeps closer. Every day, I hear of yet another person who has tested positive. Every day, Tom gets up and goes to work, Paul gets up and goes to work. Their simple fortitude is humbling.

[And] I, the desk-servant, word-worker— 

. . .  hold up my end pretty well too; but God,

 the close of day, how I fall down then.

 

                --from "Emergency Haying" by Hayden Carruth