Oh Fall! How do I love thee?

Let me count the ways.

I love thee for cooler days and the return to roasting succulent cuts of meat, for rich sauces made from boiled pan drippings, and the serene pleasure of mashed potatoes larded with butter.

I love thee for sweet baked squash paired with pork, for pan-roasted Brussels sprouts, for Greg’s chicken curry and green enchiladas, for spicy green chili served with apple-jack quesadillas.

Cranberry Sauce

I love thee for cranberry sauce.

I love thee for the return of foods that warm and comfort and transform home into an opulent elsewhere with candle lit dinners and evening baths, red wine and Beethoven.

The Big Pancake

I love thee for Sunday mornings when the sun angles through bedroom window, and Greg and I take many indolent hours with The New York Times, the big pancake and River .

River and The New York Times

I love thee for the jars of San Marzanos suspended with basil and garlic, every bit of it grown by our own hands, and the knowledge that the first blizzard’s spicy rigatoni will have its seeds in July’s hundreds of yellow star-like blossoms, in August’s ripening heat.

Spicy Rigatoni

 I love thee for the color of aspen lighting the mountain, the sound of leaves skittering across the road, and for the return of winter birds:  Junco, chickadee, nuthatch.

I love thee for all the flowers of the garden in their last poignant bloom.  I love thee for the fields steeped in honeyed gold, for the last thunder of the year and the anticipation of first snow.

Greg's Black Hollyhock - photo by Greg Marquez

And finally, I love thee the most for cozy nights when I can crawl into the skin of sleep---after too too many months of nights too hot for touch—suspended in my artist-lover’s embrace.