NOvember

When my kids were in Preschool, Marilyn—the Best Pre-School Teacher Ever—taught them about each month with a clever little ditty. For November, it was “No flowers. No leaves. November.”   

I’m also old enough to remember that, back in the day, when we were offered something mood-altering we were supposed to JUST SAY NO. Now that November has arrived with all its moody, gray skies and volatile temperature changes, I seriously considering putting that advice to work.  

NO, I will say to November, no thanks. Take your waning daylight and your bare branches and skedaddle.  I’m not interested.  

No flowers? No leaves? No thanks! Let’s just skip right over the month of November—perhaps with a small pause on the final Thursday for some family, football and food, if we must—and then get right into the Season of Light.  

Let’s string lights, and light candles, and toss some glitter around—anything that will brighten the shorter days and shorten the long, long nights. 

I don’t care if you’re not into carols or candy canes, I don’t know anybody who doesn’t appreciate Christmas lights—provided you’re not asking them to actually string the lights from the eves and trees and assorted shrubberies, that is.  

So let me offer you this free piece of advice: if the darker days are dragging you down, don’t be bound by the calendar and conventional wisdom; go hang your Christmas lights up now. And by hang them up, I of course mean try to get somebody else to do it for you.   

And if they agree, please send me their name and I’ll go dig my lights out of storage and await their arrival.  

So November? I say just say NO and let it GLOW.