Novembering

We are both still here, me and November

If I live up to 90 years (and I might, given that my mom will be 100 in April), I still have 24 years ahead of me.

That´s a lot and not so much, depending on the perspective.

It’s a lot less than young people have, but still quite a bit if I look back at what has happened in the last 24 years of my life.

When I was 42, I was married. My kids were 4, 11, and 14, and I lived in Vanuatu. I was peri-menopausal (of which I knew nothing about). I volunteered at the local Cultural Centre, trying to promote the business of their craft shop, the only locally owned one in Port Vila. I lived a comfortable expat life because I had a husband with a career and, unlike me, a salary. We had two or three dogs (we kept adopting strays).

And I was a bit lost.

Now I am 66. Divorced. My kids are 38, 35, and 28. The oldest has procreated, and there are now two little ones in the family, a 4-year-old and a 10-month-old. I live in Helsinki. I am post-menopausal (and know all about it). I write full-time. I live a modest life and, like always, mostly do work that earns me no money, but now, without a husband to rescue me. Instead, I’ve rescued a dog who is both problematic and a great companion, quite like my ex-husband.

I am still a bit lost.

And now I am also novembering.

This hit me today as I looked out the window at the bleak November morning.

The month of November is Marraskuu in Finnish. The root word marras comes from the Indo-European root (mr̥tós) and means “dead” or “dying.”

It’s an appropriate term, as nature literally dies here in November. What also dies is the sun.

I’m sure our ancestors back in the Flintstones age thought the sun literally stopped existing in November, and were genuinely astonished when they saw it again in February.

I am a great complainer, and every October, I drive everyone mad by whining about how much I hate November and the winter that follows it.

I remember a Texan acquaintance once telling me it had been raining there for a week and she was “dying inside.”

Ha! I laughed at her. Come to Finland in November, I said, and you’ll see what dying for lack of light really feels like.

I am not an empathetic person.

I keep telling everyone that I’m a summer person, and that it’s a thing, like being a morning or an evening person. There is science behind this.

But I’m not a summer person. My happiness doesn’t depend on sunlight, even though I insist it does.

I wasn’t particularly happy in Vanuatu or Mozambique.

I carry November in my heart. It’s there throughout the year. That’s how, and who, I am.

A November person.

To say November here is totally dark is, of course, not true.

Beyond the Arctic Circle, in Lapland, the sun doesn’t rise above the horizon during the 58 days of Kaamos (the Polar Night). But this doesn’t mean it’s pitch black. There’s no sunshine, but there is a glow. The sky breaks into the most magical spectrum of pastels.

And then there are the Northern Lights. Aurora Borealis. I’m telling you - you haven’t lived until you’ve witnessed them. I once saw such an overwhelming spectacle of sky gone crazy that I had to retreat indoors and close my eyes. The Northern Lights are not about light. They are psychedelic colour extravaganzas that look almost apocalyptic. If you didn’t know they were caused by particles from the solar wind colliding with Earth’s atmosphere, you’d think God was painting the sky to warn you the end was near.

In Lapland, trees don’t grow very tall, and beyond the tree line, there are no trees at all. This means the forests are gentle. You can walk in a Lappish forest during Kaamos, the snow reflecting whatever light there is, and feel completely safe. It’s as if the forest embraced you and whispered that you belong, and everything is OK.

I live in southern Helsinki, where the sun does rise during the day, but as it’s usually cloudy and rainy, we seldom see it.

But it is there.

And just to remind us that it is, it often paints the morning and evening skies with the most beautiful colours.

Back to happiness.

At 66, I am not “old” or “young.” I have reached the November of my life. It’s not winter yet, but it’s no longer summer (bloom) or even autumn (middle age).

This time of year - and this phase of life - are both melancholic and beautiful. You feel like wrapping yourself in a blanket and sitting by candlelight, sipping something hot, but you also want to go for a walk with your dog, to marvel at the beauty of dying nature. Because it is beautiful.

November is sleepy time, but not only. Sometimes you feel like you just want to sleep through it; other times, you feel like renovating your kitchen and Tindering yourself a new boyfriend.

November is also a romantic time. And a person living their November may still have a flame inside them. It may flicker, but it’s still there, a sign of life and love and, yes, even passion.

I’m not a happy person, but I do experience moments of happiness, quite like this Month of Death experiences moments of life. While writing this, I saw a little bird land on a branch of my apple tree, as if to remind me that even November still has a pulse.

It’s 11:40 a.m., and the sky is covered with a thick blanket of clouds the colour of wet sheep. It’s raining. It will be like this for days on end, and I’m not going to lie: it will be tough. So I won’t end this post by sugarcoating the tough things in life.

Tough is tough, and dark is dark, and for a person living in the dark, it’s no consolation to remind them that darkness, too, shall pass, because when it’s here, it really is here.

The only way through darkness is to sit with it, not waiting for it to be over, but allowing it to do its business. November is not only a passage into winter; it has a value of its own.

The same with being 66. Like everything in this universe, I am, like November, in the process of becoming. I will soon enter the winter of my life.

But for now, I am here - just like November.