The Experiment: Day 10 ~ It’s October! My Favorite Month Of The Year…

“October, baptize me with leaves! Swaddle me in corduroy and nurse me with split pea soup. October, tuck tiny candy bars in my pockets and carve my smile into a thousand pumpkins. O autumn! O teakettle! O grace!”
Rainbow Rowell
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When I woke up this morning and took the dogs out I nearly gasped! October had arrived overnight. The air was cool and crisp, the breeze on my face was delicious, I wait for this all year long. Since I was a little girl this has been the month. As an adult I always thought October would be a beautiful time of year to have a baby (Mine were born in January, December and May, those were lovely months too!). It finally feels like I can breathe again. Something in me releases, relaxes, and I finally feel more at home in my body and my life. It is here, it is here, it is here!

I think this is exactly what Keats meant when he wrote, “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness / Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun…” He wrote that in his poem “To Autumn.” Of course autumn spans 3 months, but October is the month. September is still mostly summer, November is often cold and rainy, but October! October is a month to dream about.

I remember reading in L.M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables, “I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.” And I sang, Yes Lucy, yes! So am I!

And there is something about October that makes it possible for me to slip out of my cocoon a little more. I feel more alive when the weather turns cool, less depressed, lighter, like a kite soaring on the breeze against a blue sky dotted with clouds. The relief is palpable, it is as if a great weight were lifted from my shoulders and I can stand up straight again. Late this afternoon I walked outside with the pugs, the leaves crunched under my feet, the dogs darted around the yard playing, they were happy, you could tell how much they like this time of the year too. Summer’s heat and winter’s cold are hard on pugs, but this weather, this is just perfect. For all of us, perfection.

“October had tremendous possibility. The summer’s oppressive heat was a distant memory, and the golden leaves promised a world full of beautiful adventures. They made me believe in miracles.”
Sarah Guillory
Reclaimed

October is filled with what I always call potent possibilities abundant. I cannot bear summers here on the coast of the Carolinas. They are terribly hot and humid for months on end. You can’t get near the beach because it is overrun with tourists. But I do not care for the beach in summer anyway. October at the beach is perfect. Most of the tourists have left, the weather is lovely, and to walk barefoot in the wet sand and feel the small waves that break against the shore flow over your feet is delicious. And it is a perfect time for a picnic at the beach. And to watch the moon rise over the ocean is like witnessing heaven on earth. And as I creep out into the world now and again in October I like to go to the thrift shops and gather tiny treasures. This weather makes me want to take up knitting and crochet again, and handspin yarn. Since the fire I have not been able to really get into my fiber work again but this year, this beautiful golden month, I am feeling that it is time. I want to make things again. Some of my greatest bliss has come when spinning yarn, making handmade dolls, and large fiber art pieces. It was another time in a different world. I have lost many things in my life these last years but this is something I think I can recover, I am going to try.


October is an enchanted month, like walking in the land of dreamy dreams while wide awake, it is a month to write new stories and tell of times gone by, this October I feel ready to live again. I just needed October’s breezes to blow into my life again. It is time, I am ready, finally…

 


The Experiment ~A 365 Day Search For Truth, Beauty &
Happiness: 
Day 1 ~ Introduction To The Project

“Do or do not. There is no try.”
Yoda

 

Comments

  1. YES, i felt the exact same way today. we had a blissful gentle rain fall, cleansing away the dross of perpetual summer, and then the breeze blew up, and my heart opened, and i ran about the house turning all the calendars over to OCTOBER, and I wrote my blob (on my website) for the first time since late May, adrenalized, grateful, and yes, shivery… as i wrote in this haiku:

    My flannel shirt jumps
    off its hanger, so ready
    to leave the closet !!!

    What a deliciously upbeat blog, dear sister. Spin and weave and dance and draw and
    sip your latte, and say ah, ah, ah!!!

    • Oh Sister Ka, how marvelous! Your post made me squee with delight! And flannel shirts! Yes! And thank you for all your good thoughts, I can’t wait to read your blog, I’m going there now! I love you honey… 🙂

  2. p.s. blog, not blob!

    xo
    ka

  3. Beautiful , deeply meaningful words you have written. I look so forward each day to your daily words. I am sure your not told or often told that your words and what you write certainly lift me up and I am sure many others feel the same.
    Thank You for sharing and in sharing giving to myself as well as others.
    I too, love October and the colors and the leaves. Life is precious and I give Thanks for You and what you write.
    Hugs and Blessings… Jim

    • Thank you so much dear Jim, thank you for coming, and commenting, and for your very kind words about my writing. You just don’t know how much that means to me. I hope you are well. And your little dog. I answered you on FB Messenger as soon as you wrote to me but I never heard back. I hope all is well! Blessings to you dearheart…

  4. Lovely post Maitri as usual. I love your writing.

    Love, Jean

    • Thank you so much Jean honey, you are very dear and your kind words mean more than you know. Blessings to you…

  5. ❤️Reading this was delightful…I try to keep up with the blogs, I know I miss a few but I’m so glad I saw this one. I love October too!

    • Oh Ellie isn’t October wonderful? I just love it so much. And I know how busy you are so thank you so much for coming to read and comment. It really means a lot to me. Blessings to you dearheart…

  6. Well done! October is my favorite month as well.

    • Thank you Eva, October is a blissy month to me. I’m glad you enjoy it as well. Thanks so much for stopping by to read and comment, it really means a lot to me… 🙂

  7. October is a favorite month of mine, too. I’m so glad that it came in with a breath of coolness in coastal NC. Here in Vancouver, BC, where we’re staying at the moment, it’s been a wonderful sunny and cool day (cool is normal, sunny is not), but we’ve been lucky and have had good weather.

    Soon we’ll be heading home to fall colors and coolness in the mountains, too. Looking forward to the diversity of the trees changing color…

    • Oh Lisa you travel to such marvelous places! It must be beautiful in Vancouver. And yes, when you return to Asheville you will have the kind of autumn I dream of. We just don’t get the changing of the leaves like you do and you have much cooler weather and even snow! It must be bliss living there. Enjoy your vacation and I know you will celebrate being back in your lovely home in the mountains. I hope this beautiful month and the rest of autumn is filled with lovely times for you and your husband… 🙂

  8. Victoria SkyDancer says

    October is my favorite month as well, for a different reason…my birthday is in the middle of the month. 🙂 Definitely looking forward to closing the book on this year and starting the book of next year!

    • Ah sweet Victoria, Happy Birthday Month! I always thought it would be a wonderful time of year to have a birthday, but mine is in my second favorite month of the year, April, so that’s lovely too, but October has my heart. I know you will have a meaningful way to usher your last year out and the new year in. I hope the year ahead is filled with many blessings and delights for you. May you be happy, and may your days be filled with peace and ease… 🙂

  9. Claudine Denert says

    The way you write about October makes me happy. It is a month just to like. Here in Belgium October can be nice, it can be sunny, with a golden glow in the sky, the smell of fallen leaves in all kinds of golden tints. It can be slightly warm.
    But here it can also be grey, cloudy, overcast, it can rain, a first Autumn storm can arrive… That, I don’t like. I prefer the golden October feel.
    With that, I can charge my battery again… I hope you can do that too…
    I wish you a very happy October…

    • Ah dear Claudine, I hope you have a lovely October this year full of golden days, days of peace and ease, when you can recharge your battery and feel better. October sounds lovely in Belgium. We too will get some rain in October but we mainly get colder days that are grey and rainy in November. I hope you are having a better day today, I was worried about you yesterday. You are in my heart and thoughts and prayers as always…

  10. How lovely your writing is.

  11. Just beautiful, Maitri! Thank you so much! Wild and windy here today with sparkling golden sunshine. Our lovely neighbours brought us some sweet juicy apples from their tree. Apple crumble, yum!

    • Thank you so much Jenny, your October days are sounding beautiful there, and apples! When I was young we lived near a big apple orchard and you could buy freshly picked apples and apple cider and the whole place smelled like heaven. And my yes, apple crumble! Enjoy! Happy October! 🙂

  12. I love the little poem you quoted at the beginning of this piece, especially the line “swaddle me in corduroy and nurse me with split pea soup”. For me, that’s a perfect image of cool, crisp fall days. I no longer own any corduroy but when I was younger I can remember the comfort of corduroy slacks. And soup, I love making homemade soup in the cold weather; such a comfort!
    Thank you for these lovely images Maitri.

    • Joan you are so welcome and yes, thank you. That quote at the beginning is from a book, the title is there. But I found that quote and fell in love with it. It just paints a perfect picture of the October I love. Before the fire I had a jacket that I loved. It was super soft teal corduroy and I loved it dearly. It’s one of the things that broke my heart to lose, I had many happy memories associated with that jacket. And yes, soup just goes with fall doesn’t it. I have been craving some potato soup with bacon in it. Rich and creamy. I shall have to find a recipe for it. Thanks for being here with me on this journey, it means more than you could possibly know. Happy October honey! 🙂

  13. This is beautiful….your love for this time of the year simply jumps off of the page. October for me is a month of festivals – we celebrate Diwali, the Festival of Lights, this month – and busy times at work. It’s also the time when I yearn to be out, enjoying the cool breeze, and to start to root within to start to release and plan for the coming year.

    • Modern Gypsy, oh, I have seen pictures of the celebration of Diwali and it looks so beautiful, it must be magical to be there to celebrate it. I wish you a very happy month of festivals — what a wonderful way to celebrate this beautiful month! Have a wonderful time!

  14. “There is something in October sets the gypsy blood astir.”
    William Bliss Carman

    I’m sure October has been a favorite month for poets as well as non-poets, as there is so much written about this month. There are more than enough for a poem, or quotation, for every day of this month.
    I used the one by Rainbow Rowell on my blog today!

    • You are so right Margaretha! So many wonderful quotes about October, and yes! Isn’t the quote by Rainbow Rowell just wonderful? DO send me a link to your blog so I can go read it! 😀

      • Click on my name above, and then click on “PÅ LIVETS TRASSLIGA BASTMATTA”. But it’s all in Swedish, and Google translate usually makes a mess of it.
        Margaretha

        • Margaretha! I found and read your blog post and left a comment. Sadly it is kind of hard to read it all because the Google translation is not good but I was delighted to have seen it and MY GOODNESS you have written SO MUCH on that blog. If it was in English I would take a day just to read through your lovely posts. Congratulations on a job well done. I’m delighted to have seen it! 🙂

  15. A wonderful and thoughtful post! I love October too. It’s so warm in colour and makes me happy for the upcoming winter. 🙂

    • Thank you so much Sal, and yes! Isn’t October wonderful? Positively dreamy! I hope you have a wonderful month full of blessings and delights. Enjoy these golden days…

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