And Now It's November

The rainbow on Halloween morning.

The final day of October began auspiciously. The sunrise started with a beautiful red sky, but then a misty rain began to fall and while the eastern sky turned orange, a huge rainbow appeared in the western sky. But then it stayed dreary and drizzly all day, not as inspiring. We’d planned to light the bonfire out on the edge of the orchard that night for Halloween, but it was too wet. Instead, we only lit the jack-o’-lanterns. We had no trick-or-treaters, we never do, but we did get to see pictures of our grandchildren trick-or-treating in their costumes.

Sunrise on Halloween.

Another shot of the rainbow.

The Thayn girls trick-or-treating in the rain.

The Rocky Mountain Howes.

I never know what to expect in November. In years past we’ve had Novembers when pleasant autumn weather lingered on through the month and others where cold and snowy winter arrived early. This year it started out a bit gloomy. We had several mornings of heavy fog. Toward the latter half of the week, the weather turned beautiful, more like August than November. Even so, it is not a very colorful month. The memory of October’s bright colors is still too fresh to make me appreciate the more subtle colors of November. The richest colors seem to come at dawn and dusk when on a good day, the sky goes crazy with color.

A sunrise last week.

Another sunrise.

Sunset on Friday.

November, despite it’s name, isn’t the ninth month of the year, just as September isn’t the seventh, October isn’t the eighth, or December the tenth. But it wasn’t until I learned Japanese that it seemed silly to me that these months are misnamed. Couldn’t the Romans count? But then I learned that the Roman year used to start in March, which gives the months their proper place number. Under the ancient Roman system, July was originally called Quintilis, meaning fifth, and August was called Sextilis, meaning sixth. July was renamed in honor of Julius Caesar after his assassination in 44 B.C., and in 8 B.C. the month Sextilis was renamed after Caesar Augustus, nephew of Julius Caesar and the first emperor of Rome. The other months are all named after Roman deities or festivals – January after Janus, the two-faced Roman god of beginnings and endings, February, from februalia, the name of a Roman purification festival held during the month, March after Mars, the Roman god of war, April from aperire, the Latin for “to open,” the month when buds open, May after Maia, the goddess of growing plants, and June from Juno, wife of Jupiter, the Roman ancient goddess of marriage and childbirth. Almost every European language uses a version of the Roman month names, even Greek and the Teutonic languages. The Slavic languages, Russian, Czech, Croatian, etc. have their own incomprehensible names and the Celtic languages, Irish, Welsh, Scots Gaelic, have a mixture of Roman and Celtic names. In Irish and Scots Gaelic, November is called Samhain and in Welsh it is Tachwedd. There always seems to be too many consonants in Welsh words.

My Thanksgiving cactus (Schlumgera truncata) in bloom right now.

The Japanese calendar, at least the modern one I learned, is more pragmatic if a bit boring in naming the months. Like some of our Latinate months, the Japanese just number them (correctly) starting with January, ichigatsu, “month one,” down to December, junigatsu, “month twelve”. They had an ancient calendar where the months were named things like Mutsuki the “Month of Love” (January), Yayoi the month of “New Life” (March), and Shimotsuki the “Frost Month” (November). But they don’t use those names anymore except when waxing poetic.

The kanji for Yayoi, Mutsuki, and Shimotsuki.

The first of November was All Saints’ Day, also called All Hallows’ Day, a holiday that seems to have been overwhelmed by its precursor, All Hallows’ Eve, Halloween. In Mexico the first two days of November are celebrated as the Dia de Los Muertos, the Day of the Dead. This year we began embracing an altered version of the Dia de Los Muertos as a new family tradition. At the Thayn house, they set up an ofrenda, a sort of altar dedicated to remembering our ancestors. They displayed pictures of grandparents and great grandparents and ate foods that were known to be their favorites. Rachel baked a pan de muertos, bread of the dead. At our house, we did not set up an ofrenda, maybe we’ll start doing that next year, but Miriam did bake conchas, delicious lime infused sweet bread rolls.

The Thayn's ofrenda.

Rachel's pan de muertos.

Miriam's lime conchas.

I could have gone to school on Thursday, but I had too many things I wanted to do at home. I’d planned to spend the day processing pumpkins, but it turned out to be too nice a day to be inside. After it warmed and the frost was gone, I went outside and stayed there. It was in the 60's all afternoon and I loved it. I dug up my dahlia tubers and gladiolus corms and set them to dry out a bit before I pack them away down cellar for the winter. I mowed one last time. I’ve said several times that I’d mowed for the last time, but this time really was the last time. I cut the lawn short. I also mowed up leaves. All my trees are bare except for my tulip tree (Liriodendron tulipifera). It’s always the last tree to drop its leaves and they are big leaves. I don’t like them to sit on the lawn over the winter. They get slimy and make a dense layer that kills the grass under them. I mowed them up and spread the shredded leaves in the garden. There were still quite a few leaves left on the tree, but yesterday a strong west wind came and whisked them all away, at night, of course, like in Camelot.

Digging up dahlia tubers.

Tulip tree leaves on the lawn.

Friday was another fine day. I went into town and bought chicken feed. After returning home and unloading the feed, I finally began processing pumpkins. I had a dozen of various sizes to do. I used the pressure cooker and the Instant Pot to cook them, one in each at a time. By the end of the day, I managed to get through six of them. The rest will have to wait until this week. I could have done more, but the lovely weather kept luring me outdoors. During the day, I saw posts online from family out west showing the snow that fell there. I was glad to boast to them that it was 70° and I was gardening in shirt sleeves, knowing full well my boasting ability would not last long. Later in the afternoon Miriam helped me bag sauerkraut. I had two five gallon buckets fermenting on the back porch. We bagged one bucket and got nineteen quarts that we put into the freezer. The second bucket will have to wait a while longer.

Kraut bagged and ready for the freezer.

Saturday we were up early and on the road to Palmyra before sunrise. We had an assignment at the Bishop’s Storehouse and an appointment at the Palmyra Temple. The drive north started out in the dark, but by the time we were approaching Avon, New York, there was a spectacular sunrise. We arrived at the Storehouse a little late, but were still able to help fill food orders. The Bishop’s Storehouse is across the road from the Hill Cumorah. When we finished there, we drove on to the temple. Our appointment there was for 2:00, but we got there at 10:00, so they moved us up and let us go to the 11:00 session. As always, it was a great and uplifting experience. After the session, we drove back to the Hill Cumorah and ate a lunch we packed in the parking lot and then we headed home. I don’t remember much of the drive home. I fell asleep somewhere near East Bloomfield, New York (Stacey was driving, of course), and didn’t wake up until we were crossing the state line back into Pennsylvania. We got home in time for me to do the afternoon chores. The rest of the day we just lounged around.

Sunrise on the way to Palmyra.

At the Palmyra Temple.

We are home from church. Our meetings went fine. It is Fast Sunday, so I’m hungry. Hannah is making tuna cheese melts on homemade bread for lunch. They smell amazing. The weather has continued unseasonably warm. It rained a little on the drive home from church, but not much and it’s still 70°. I like this kind of November weather. It would be nice it if it would stay like this until the week before Christmas, but I know it won’t so I’ll enjoy it while it lasts.