Last year winter was unusually cold and snowy in Boston, and predictions are that this year it will be again. I’ve been kind of dreading it. I generally get just a bit of seasonal affective disorder, but last year felt a little harder to cope with. The upside to this polar vortex effect that has been making the winters colder is that this summer was remarkably, beautifully mild. I think I got the deepest tan I’ve ever had this year (which is still not saying much) simply because there were so many more days that I could actually go outside without getting heat stroke. But in September it got really chilly for a week or two and I sort of sank into a vague hopelessness that winter was going to be long and dark and hard.

But then — October came, the weather warmed a little, and the early maples burst gloriously into red flame, and I realized I’d been forgetting my favorite season and New England’s greatest consolation. Not only do we get spring as a reward for making it through a harsh New England winter, we also get autumn to ease us into the cold and darkness with such overwhelming beauty that it’s hardly bearable. As Edna St. Vincent Millay, a Mainer, put it:

“Lord, I do fear
Thou’st made the world too beautiful this year;
My soul is all but out of me,—let fall
No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.”

So I rallied my courage and my energy, strapped on my bike helmet and my camera bag and headed out to Lars Anderson Park to soak in the colors. Here are some of the pictures I took.