Having grown up in Manhattan, I know and understand winter. New York City has winter. January streets are dreary and gray and yellow cabs streaked with dirt soak pedestrians with the ubiquitous slush of water, drainage and dog shit. I loved winter in New York. I still remember standing over steamy manholes while chewing on a warm vendor pretzel.
Having left “the City” for SoCal during my teenage years, I learned to forget seasonal transitions. We traded in the mixed precipitation and windy streets for sunny days, comfortable nights, and climactic stability. Snow was that stuff in Big Bear and Arrowhead... it was in the mountains, if you could see through the smog. To the denizens of SoCal a seasonal transition was an excuse to buy a new car.
Today Tamy and I live in Minnesota...
I thought I knew winter, but that was just a lie. On September 25th the temperature kissed 80 degrees, ten days later we struggle to hit 45. The cold is on its way and the landscape is beginning to change. We have entered the great transition. Fall in Minnesota is beautiful and painfully brief. Leaves begin to change in September and their delicate petioles cling to caring branches as relentless winds howl from the North. The locals who seem to trace their ancestry back to the dawn of humanity embrace the cold and treat it like a friend. It is no friend to us. We shiver and whine as the temperature dips... fall foreshadows and pain will follow.
As green is replaced by orange I try to capture one last moment of sanity. Our photographs are a record of what could be, and they are a reminder of better times. We are in the great transition and I’m afraid to sleep... winter may arrive tomorrow.
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