Fall in New England is the most glorious season of the year.
A Weekend in Vermont
I catch a hint of its arrival in mid-August. I can see it in the angle of the sunrise through the leaves in the morning. If I stop and let the air wash over me, I can feel the slight chill under the heat. It’s brief, but it’s a taste of what’s to come.
My neighborhood parkThe maple tree in my yard
Skip to mid September and I feel the cold within the heat and the heat within the cold. If I close my eyes I can imagine both a fall day and winter is coming or a spring day and summer is around the corner!
Vermont steel bridge
October. Now October is the Gem of the season! That’s when we have glorious colors and bright blue skies. Every tree I see, I want to take a picture of it! I’ve been on many motorcycle trips during “leaf peeping” season and my head is on a swivel looking at the beautiful scenery and enjoying the wonderful weather.
I like to nibble all the chocolate off the sides and top first. Then I start on the peanut butter layers inside. I work all around the bar until it’s gone. It gets messy!
I haven’t had a butterfinger bar in a very long time.
I’ve been taking a 5 minute meditation in the morning after my Peloton workout.
In the early part of the class she says “what we look for we have a tendency to find”. Now I know this, but to hear it as I’m mediating was like a lightbulb moment.
I run a business. Most mornings I would wake up with the thought, “oh boy what’s going to happen to day”, and it was never in a “yay! Can’t wait to start my day!”
But over time I decided to try and be grateful. I wake up and thank God for this day and what it will bring me – without the negativity! Some days are better than others, because that’s life. But if I look for the rainbow instead of the thunderclouds, things will be alot brighter right?
Best Job: Programming Assistant at WTNH-8 in New Haven Connecticut. I was involved with every department at the station. I was there for almost two years until I moved to California.
Worst Fast Food Job: McDonalds. It was also my first job. I hated it. I couldn’t add up the orders in my head. I lasted 6 months.
Best Fast Food Job: Wendy’s. We had registers that we punched the orders in and it would tell you how much change to give back! I worked with a lot of great people and the food was so much better than McDonalds!
First Career Job: I started as a receptionist for the American Cancer Society and over five years moved to different positions with more responsibility and money.
Least Understood Job: Executive assistant in the Municipal Bonds Department at Goldman Sachs in San Francisco. Beautiful view of the city from the windows but a very boring job. I lasted there 8 months and thankfully moved north.
Fun Job: Working in the strawberry fields for two summers. In the spring we worked to get the field ready and during picking season we directed people where to pick and weighed and rang up the pickings.
Like a Family/Second Chance Job: I applied for a job as an office assistant for an insurance company when we moved north. I didn’t get the job but they called a few days later offering another one because someone gave their 2 week notice! There were 4 or 5 of us all close in age and we all had our children at the same time! We were all transplants to California and the office manager was like a mother to us all. I was there for about five years until we moved back to Connecticut.
Most Educational Job: I worked part time in an elementary school library for five years. I loved getting to know the kids and reading the books! I left when the remodeling business picked up and I needed to put a full day in the office. Runner up: I went back to the same school a few years later and worked in the cafeteria for a year and a half. That was tough and I finally gave up working part time for good.
Longest Job: 25 years with my husband in our remodeling business. I’ve gone from doing all the office work myself to having a fabulous office person who takes care of all the clients leaving me with the bookkeeping and social media.
I am so grateful I grew up before the internet existed!
I think back to life in my 20s and I would have been a MESS if I had a telephone at my fingertips, never mind being able to text, or swipe, or google, or Find My Phone someone!
Ironically, the internet would have been really handy when I met my future husband in Jamaica in 1987. He lived in California and I lived in Connecticut. We learned about each other through letters and phone calls and at the end of five months I was on my way to live with him. Imagine that! I didn’t learn everything about him on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter.
What does “having it all” mean to you? Is it attainable?
Today’s prompt is a good one!
Can we have it all? Does the pursuit of something you want – money, a home, a family, a high paying job, better health – cause the scale to tip towards that and create an imbalance of “everything else” you want? Or is the thing you are pursuing going to lead to being able to “have it all”?
I think it’s a really big juggling act to be able to get to the point where you can say “YES, I finally have it all!”. And do we even want to utter those words because you know, that’s exactly when the other shoe will drop and then you will say you jinxed yourself. Oh, is that only me who would do that?
Looking back on the past 44 years, I had a career that I backburnered for family, but I became my own boss. I have a home that I love, but it took a circuitous route to get there. I have a family that I love, that had complications both in meeting my husband, and having our son. I have my health which I am faithful to maintain. I have money in the bank but it came at the expense of the death of a loved one.
I don’t want to jinx myself so I will say – I am happy at this point in my life. Is that Having It All? Maybe the answer to the question is another question – Are You Happy?, and my answer would be Yes, I am Happy.
I guess if I didn’t think they were “dear”, I wouldn’t wear these same four rings every day.
rings I wear every day
The thick band with the diamond – the band was my mother in law’s wedding band. We had a new diamond put in for our 30th wedding anniversary.
The thin band is my original wedding band.
The silver ring holds a Danburite crystal. I found it in an antique store in Sonora California while visiting my father in law in 2022. It was meant to be – I was getting ready to leave but decided to look at the jewelry and this stuck out. The crystal takes its name from Danbury Connecticut (I’m born and raised in Connecticut), and it fit perfectly!
The bottom ring is a worry band I bought while visiting with friends in Los Cabos Mexico. It was a splurge and I have worn it since early 2020.
I have a lot of other rings, but these 4 just feel so right together!
I am cold if it’s 90 degrees and a cloud passes over the sun.
I always wear a coat or sweater out the door in the morning and usually keep it on most of the day because the air conditioning is blowing on me, or if the heat is on it’s still not warm enough.
Does that give you an idea of how I feel about cold weather?
As long as I am prepared for it, I can be ok about it. But I will always turn off the ceiling fan when I sit in the living room to watch tv because it’s blowing on me!
It was a sunny Saturday in September of 1972 and I was 12 years old.
My childhood (and current) home
One of my sisters and a friend or two were performing flips in the front year. We would start from the steps and head towards the flag pole.
I completed a few flips, but on the last attempt I ran, flipped, and landed on the top of my right foot. There was intense pain and I couldn’t walk. We all shouted for my mother. She came out and off the two of us went to the emergency room. We waited for a few hours for X-rays that confirmed I broke a little bone in the back of my ankle. I came home in a cast to my knee and crutches.
My diary entry!
It was a miserable 8 weeks. First with the crutches, and then with a “walking cast” which back then was a rubber block they attached to the bottom of the cast. In my case even with my highest heel on the other side, I was still lopsided, walking like Peg-Leg Pete! I would have been better off with crutches. What a relief it was when the cast finally came off but how weird my leg looked!
But I wasn’t the only one who suffered that weekend….
The incident happened on Saturday, September 9, 1972. My older sister’s 14th birthday and the family party was scheduled for the next day. My mother was in the process of baking her delicious 4 layer chocolate cake with whipped cream between layers and covered with chocolate frosting. She was likely making whatever meal we would be eating beforehand.
Aha! proof that I didn’t spoil the party, just “her day”!
Thoughts From The Passenger Seat 