A new friend in Vermont was teasing me the other day when the overnight low dropped to around 20 degrees. “You southerners think that’s cold? Just wait until January; you’ll be lucky if that’s the high for the day.” It’s not so much what he said — I’m sure he’s right — as the way he said it, with a kind of knowing smirk.

My reply wasn’t what he was expecting, I think. “Tell you what,” I said. “I’ll be ready for it just the way I was ready when the thermometer hit 100-degrees in late September back in South Carolina. You don’t ever get ready for that, actually; you just get through it as best you can.” And we’re confident we’ll get through our first New England winter.

But in the meantime — how about this fall? Yeah, it’s been occasionally cold in the mornings, but a surprising (for us, anyway) number of days have felt very much like we believed fall ought to be: mild days, some good sun, and chilly nights. In fact, we were just finishing up stacking a cord of wood in the shed out back (please see an earlier post to know how that happened) today and reveling in bright sun and temperatures nearing 60. That would seem about as good as it might get in New England in November, and we are enjoying every minute of it. A dear friend of mine who smokes — in spite of my counsel against it — takes her cigarettes outside every morning for a few puffs, and lately she’s been telling me that’s it’s been more pleasurable than it ought to be. “Colder weather now and I might be smoking less,” she said ruefully. “Or at least faster.”

Of course, the Farmers Almanac predicts a major snowstorm coming up soon. And I heard the television meteorologist telling everyone the other night that the snow season begins pretty soon, that period of time when New Hampshire and its neighbors in New England can expect snowfall at any time, and the ground pretty much disappears under whiteness and won’t reappear until April. I felt like saying, ok, bring it on. I’ve had my fall, and it was real and it was very wonderful, and now I’m all set for late fall and winter, whenever. It’s inevitable, so why not embrace it? After all, I’ve got my eyes on a nice looking pair of snowshoes. And we’ve got that cord of wood all set up.