This is the earliest I have ever started wanting it to snow. A few friends in far-off, more easily romanticized parts of the country have already had theirs, and even though a fair number of our trees are still what you would call "pretty" with color, I think we need to get on with it. It feels like we are behind here, which we usually are.

And I keep saying the last lines of this Michael Burkard poem to myself and to Catherine:

A star reports
to another star.

Reading lines like this that are pretty but removed feels a little like looking through a window at snow.