A zipper clinks in the dryer as a pair of jeans tumbles round and round. The refrigerator hums. Shower water patters in our bathroom, and a brush clacks on the vanity in our daughter’s bathroom as she gets ready for work. Our son left a few minutes ago to go back to college, and the house is quiet except for these sounds.

I returned last weekend from two weeks away and went straight into Thanksgiving. Thanks to the holiday, our son was here for my homecoming, and that was the best homecoming I could ask for. I worked for one day to try to catch up on a few things, but took the rest of the week off to be with my family. I needed the break after being on and in work mode for two weeks straight. Being present with our kids soothed and rejuvinated me.

Our kids are more adult than children now, and they’re my favorite people to hang out with. We laughed a lot this week. We played Euchre a few times, Scattergories once, and our son taught us a new solitaire that I can’t remember the name of. Our son got us hooked on the excellent show The Bear, and we introduced him to Our Flag Means Death. On Thanksgiving day, we made cocktails for all of us (Tom Collins for our son, rum sour for our daughter, martinis for my husband and me) so they can get a taste for the finer things instead of the crappy stuff kids drink when the objective is to get drunk instead of enjoy a nice drink.

From Thanksgiving, we went into Christmas within a day. Friday was the only day we’d all be together until mid-December, which is later than we want to get our Christmas tree. So on Black Friday, we were at Spruce Ridge Tree Farm for our annual family outing to select our tree. We lit a fire that night and decorated together while we drank hot cocoa spiked with Irish cream.

Now, our living room looks like a Christmas jungle. The mantle is lined with candles, greenery, and conical tabletop trees in silvers and holly berry red. Snake plants flank the fireplace, palm fronds wave airily in the corner, and the monstera is taking over the front windows. And opposite those tropical plants is a beautiful temperate evergreen dressed in twinkling white lights and glittering ornaments.

Outside, the aloe on the deck is brown and deflated; its droopy leaves melt over the side of the pot like Dalí’s clocks. The first frost came while I was away. The trees are now naked and the landscape is brown; autumn is over.

Inside, the house smells of fir and white pine. Our son’s door is open and his room is empty. December is just around the corner, though, and he’ll be home again. Soon after that, the calendar will change over to 2024. And then we’ll be in the year our daughter leaves home and we enter a completely different stage of our lives.