Of lights, night, and early morning

In winter, night photography becomes less of a whim and more of a...must. First photo: don't miss the moon. Last photo: I woke (I wake early) to a strangely diffuse white glow outside - a magical overnight fog had had a most interesting transformative effect on the light of the street lamps.

Happy New Year, you all.

Gratitudes + things that are making me happy

• Animal rights reading (although I seem now to have misplaced the book in question, 60% of my way through it...)

• Bibliopedestrianism - both the practice and the word

• Gentle yoga videos

• Anniversary plans

• Singing with friends

• Blog comments

• Pared-down Twitter (I shaved away most of my follows and followers)

• No Instagram anymore

• Being the girlfriend of a grad student who is currently done with finals!

• Flannel sheets

• Short work weeks

• Doing my best at work, and my best getting better

• Bouquets of what's actually growing in December in Northern California (currently: marigolds, eucalyptus, fir, and some other things I can't name)

• A break from Hebrew classes, and plans to fill it in with Hebrew-language movies

• Weekend breakfast the way my girlfriend's grandparents have it: tomato-cucumber-green onion salad, and cheese on bread

• Call the Midwife

Farmers' market still life

With night falling early, my farmers' market takes place partly after dark now. Most of the farms illuminate their produce with strings of lights hanging from their canopies; this one simply put their lights on top of their produce. I loved the effect - an uncalculated but striking display that looked like the old masters would have turned it into a painting.

Autumn fog walk

This is the beach I grew up with, and this is the type of beach I grew up thinking of as normal - gray, cool, dangerous to swim at, and sweetly melancholy in appearance.

Walking on this cool morning, bundled up, I chatted on the phone with my dad and then simply kept myself company with song and camera. As the sun gradually brightened the fog, I was struck by how the color of the sky melded into that of the water's shine.

Thank you to the gulls and sanderlings for making the beach even more enchanting, and thanks to the surfers for making me feel extra warm by comparison.

Gratitudes + things that are making me happy

• Replacing crackers in my diet with fresh bread

• Work calming down in the wake of Thanksgiving

• Reading Frankenstein with my college best friend

• Brewing full teapots of tea instead of just one mug's worth

• Drinking tea in the shower

• Homemade mashed potatoes

• The nearly magical benefits of some stretching time during the workday

• Rain clouds

• Experimenting with buying as many of my gifts locally as possible

• Also experimenting with a non-perfectionist attitude towards choosing gifts, in the interest of not having quite so many left to buy at the last minute

• My oldest niece asking for a diary for Christmas. As someone with a cherished journaling habit of nearly twenty years, I could not be more touched.

• That hygge book

• An unexpected field trip with a coworker to stop by a customer in the middle of the day today - a short drive by the water with a Beach House soundtrack. Delighful!
 
• Early bedtimes to make up for late ones