The nights and days have grown very cold here, with the surroundings resembling November more than October. Darkness arrives earlier and I've begun to wonder about winter silence and the late afternoon darkness. I've found in the past few weeks for one of the first times I can remember that there is something so familiar about darkness. It's warm and comforting in ways that you would never think of it, yet in ways that sunshine cannot be.
Earlier this week I woke up before the sun (undoubtedly for one of the first time in months...) and remembered many mornings spent that way. I thought of school buses and early morning travel. As the sun sets earlier, it brings memories that the distraction of longer sunlight doesn't bring. It reminds me of community, of conversation and quilts and homework near lamps on fall and winter nights, of couches and sleeping and seeing the world in a different way, through darkness behind branches and above fallen leaves. Of course the darkness reminds me of spending last fall and winter at a latitude farther north than I am now. I've thought briefly of the constant darkness there, and how as dramatic as it was, I don't remember minding it then, and I miss it now. Winter darkness is different than summer darkness. It's quieter, more common and earlier, stiller, less alive, resting, a pause of movement.
Recently I worked for my internship about an hour and a half north of here, on the Canadian border. I commuted with a co-worker and was pleased I was able to take several photos along the drive. :)
A week later, I went on a train journey to New York City. The trip was smooth, roughly nine hours each way and sprinkled with bright colors and small towns.
Northern Vermont
I think it was near this point that although we were still in Vermont, my phone carrier considered my phone to be in Canada.
A sunset recently in Colchester, Vermont.
Northern Vermont from the train :)
Western Massachusetts
Manhattan from afar.
I love the two extremes in scenery, it happens so gradually over hours of travel, yet seeing the city suddenly makes the transition feel so sudden, all mountains and most foliage had disappeared by this point.
On the train journey back north, the Connecticut river, somewhere near the border between Connecticut and Massachusetts.
Western Massachusetts
Western Massachusetts, the sun set shortly afterwards, leaving the remaining journey through Vermont to be quite dark.
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