Another chilly morning in the little northern city by the sea. No frost in my garden yet, but on our walk yesterday morning my friend pointed out glints of ice in the cemetery grass. We ambled along the paths, marking our progress by which trees seemed most beautiful to us. She saw a big hawk but I did not. I found a handsome cluster of acorn caps. The sky was a most miraculous blue.

I worked on some class planning in the morning, then spent much of the afternoon on garden tasks. I tore out the last of the tomatoes and stripped the vines of green fruit. I picked what may be the last of the eggplant. I pulled out tired zinnias and scarlet runners. Autumn cleanup is daunting, and I have much more to do, but there's no rush. And there's still so much growing: a royal crop of kale, fennel frothing along the front path, still plenty of lettuce and arugula and a few obstinate spinach plants that survived the September drought, oregano and sage and cilantro and parsley and mint, even some weary basil, and then the red and gold marigolds, spilling over the terrace onto the sidewalk.

Today I'll cook down the green tomatoes for salsa verde, and maybe make a few fresh pickles as well. I made a batch of red tomato sauce yesterday, and most of that will go into the freezer, though I'll save out some for tonight's lasagna. I've got desk work to do this morning, but also a few errands to run, and I'll get onto my mat before breakfast and I'll get out into the garden after lunch, and it will be a household day, it will be a day to carry firewood and fold laundry and stir a vat of sauce on the stove, to read about the buildup to the French and Indian War and fiddle with a poem draft and dream up some writing prompts, and shuffle through the unraked leaves as a thread of woodsmoke rises from my chimney.