near the end of autumn in the southeast.

This time of year in the southeastern United States has these mid-morning thaws, in which a thin veneer of overnight or early morning frost beings to melt in the brilliant near-winter sunlight.

This thaw is like the renewing of the mind, the growing midday temperature being a kind of growing hope, a kind of destiny enlarging and increasing with the advance of the clock.

And overnight?  Like the caterpillar entering his little cocoon for later, a kind of "gone to earth" type of wish for rejuvenation, and during the day, the romance is to come as the thaw comes, the ice "effervescing", turning from white to clear, a thin skin of frost becoming water, and the clear water then evaporating in the later midday.

We're in a kind of bated breath that happens between Thanksgiving and Christmas, when the advertisers are wanting our money, and the loved ones are beginning to impinge upon our time: baking, shopping, the red velour ribbons, green wreaths of cedar or pine, and the white oak leaves are our version of snow across the SEC.