Fall has arrived and with it fall weather – which is awesome (with the exception of leaves – which aren’t so awesome when you’re highly allergic to leaf mold like I am). Cooler days and cool nights mean I’m sleeping better and can actually walk the dog in the middle of the day when he prefers it without melting into a blob on the sidewalk. I quite enjoy fall. It’s not too hot, not generally too cool, there’s football to watch, playoff baseball in Toronto, and Thanksgiving at the family cottage to look forward to.
We’ve done Thanksgiving at the cottage for years now. Even without mum, Dad and I wanted to keep up the tradition. It’s also a good weekend to get fall work done at the cottage, take in the dock and generally clean up the place. Dad will go up at least once more after Thanksgiving to clear leaves off the beach but Thanksgiving is generally my last trip up to the cottage for the season (this is partly due to the dog – he loves getting messy up there and it’s too cool to have to wash him). We usually have a turkey dinner up there. It’s not that much harder to cook up there than it is to do at home – the stove is smaller and runs hot but as long as I remember that and adjust the oven temp accordingly, it’s pretty nice. I also really enjoy having Thanksgiving dinner while looking out over the lake and at the gorgeous fall colours.
I spend a lot of time over Thanksgiving taking pictures of leaves – I love looking at all the different colours. I’m incredibly thankful that I have the ability to go to cottage country and look at the gorgeous colours every fall. Of course there’s a lot of work to be done, but I can always find a few minutes to sit on the deck and quietly appreciate the foliage. I’m a little biased here, but I think Canadian Thanksgiving comes at the perfect time – right in the middle of the fall harvest, when we literally have a cornucopia of things to be thankful for. Which made me think about cornucopias and so they became my Word Wednesday word today.
Cornucopia is a neat word – it hasn’t changed in meaning or usage at all over the years. The word comes from the Latin (surprise!) words cornu copiae – which literally mean “Horn of Plenty” – which is one of the definitions of cornucopia. The other meaning of cornucopia relates to the “plenty” aspect of the original meaning – a cornucopia of fall harvest vegetables simply means an abundance of them. So to all those who are celebrating Thanksgiving this weekend, I wish you a cornucopia of good food, good drinks, and good conversation with those who mean the most of you.
Oh… and one more picture from last Thanksgiving because, leaves.
Cornucopia cor·nu·co·pia noun
- A curved goat’s horn overflowing with fruit and ears of grain that is used as a decorative motif emblematic of abundance.
- An abundant supply of good things of a specified kind / an inexhaustible source.