Winter Fluff

   I really really do love this time of year. I love the crisp mornings. I love the sun shining in the afternoon. I love the guilty pleasure of hot cocoa at night when the house cools down. I love planning for the holidays. I love the recipes and goodies and the smiles.

    This is the most perfect time of year.

    This is also Oklahoma, which means that although the spring has similar temperatures and sunlight, November does not generally bring the threat of tornadoes. A wonder to be sure.

    While other states are selling tourists on their "fall colors" tours, I can see why that would just not work here. Yes, we do have trees. Yes, the leaves do change colors, but it all happens a bit more dramatically here. 

     The weather shifts quickly. There is usually no gentle lull into the chill that causes the colors to change, so it would seem that just over a weekend, all of the trees are turning.

     We often get storms here. We also have very few days that are not what most would describe as "windy".

     I walked outside yesterday and realized that all of the trees in my neighborhood had very few leaves left.

    Oh yeah... it was pretty windy the other night.

     It's pretty funny. One day I drive by and all of the trees have green leaves. That weekend I drive by and they are beautiful colors of fall, red, orange...golden...And a few days later I drive by and giggle. 

    I can't help it. Secretly, I am that immature. I always imagine that one of the trees sneezed and all of their clothes burst off of them. The trees are naked. They are there to face the winter with no fluff, bare, for all of the world to see what they are made of.

     It always makes me giggle.

     In other states, the trees seem to shed their leaves a few at a time, like a long slow dance of nature. Here, they just burst out of their clothes.

      Things really are different here. This last weekend I was in a town where everyone really did know everyone else. It was fascinating. My grandfather went into the gas station and asked if anyone had seen my 85 year old great uncle. Three people answered that they had seen him that morning.

     I gaped with astonishment. I am so invisible in my world. If someone were to ask the local gas station attendent if anyone had seen me, I doubt there would be a comprehensible answer. Here that would be an incomprehensible question.

     I laugh.

     If just those things were compared, my life would seem sort of sad. I roam invisibly through stores and gas stations. I am not anybody "special".

     And yet I am. I am aware every day of how many friends I have. I am aware of how many people care about me. My friends are like the leaves on the trees. They are colorful, beautiful and amazing.

     Unlike the leaves on the trees, I know my friends will still be with me through the winter.

      I have plenty of fluff around me to get me through the winter and I like it.

      God Bless each and every one of you.

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