Autumn

Despite what the days might show you, with their occasional warmth and humidity, autumn is coming; I know this because the Northern nights are getting cool.  Cool enough at first for me to open the boxes marked 'Fall Clothing For Children', and then cool enough to tuck the aforementioned children into bed with, in Samuel's case, a giant ancient plaid sleeping bag of David's that he's fallen in love with, and in Clara's case a yellow wool blanket and a quilt that once graced my own crib, and both of them with hot water bottles.  Finally I broke down the other night, gritted my teeth and turned on the furnace.

David was cleaning the cat box at the time and said he was amazed to hear the vent beside him leap into life.

This is also when I discovered that I had placed our mattress and boxspring directly over the vent in the bedroom and would have to rearrange all of the furniture.

And last night, to my disgust, while I was about the turn on the heat I discovered that an earwig had beaten me to it and was curled up (and completely inaccessible) inside the thermostat.

And yet I was expecting differences in the climate, moving from a temperate place to one more northern and cold; what I wasn't expecting was developing allergies.  I am constantly scratching my eyes, sneezing and putting into use my extensive collection of lovely handkerchiefs.  It's all very upsetting; fall is my favorite season, and here I am wheezing through it.  I'm still not sure what it is that I'm reacting to here that didn't exist where we used to live!