It's officially Fall. The steamy dog breath of summer has moved on, thank goodness; The trees in Nubbins are showing off their finest golds, reds, and deep purples; and the air has that spicy bite of woodsmoke. Nice, huh? So why do I feel a tinge of sadness?

It's that inevitable booger called "Change." I know, I know, we're supposed to live in the moment, not hold onto the past, and accept change as part of life. Yeah, yeah, I get it, but that doesn't mean it's easy.

Take my walk around Nubbins Town Square with the Walkie Talkies this morning. First of all, Pearl wasn't there and she'd missed a few other walks recently.

"Maybe she's gotten a creative spurt with her watercolors," Grace offered.

"Well, she might have mentioned it," said Pepper, slightly huffy.

"I saw her a couple of days ago and asked her how things were, and she just said `Fine,'" said Myrtle. "Didn't mention that she wouldn't be walking today."

Nobody had anything to add, so we just kept walking, the leaves crunching under our feet as we pondered Pearl's absence.

Then Pepper brought up Thanksgiving and said she'd told her husband Murray she was doing absolutely nothing this year. Not visiting any relatives, not inviting anyone over, and not cooking a single turkey.

"I've just got too much going on. I need some time off," she said.

"What did Murray say?" asked Grace.

"At first he seemed shocked, but then he started to like the idea," Pepper said, smiling. "The relatives won't be happy, but they'll get over it. Sometimes you just have to do something for yourself."

"Speaking of that," said Roberta, turning slightly pink. "I'm doing something a bit different this year too. The kids will be with my ex, so ... I think I'm going to ... um ... go skiing."

"Skiing?" I asked, stopping in my tracks. "Since when do you ski?" It's not like we live in ski country, after all. People in Nubbins don't run off to ski resorts out of the blue. At least nobody I know does.

"I've skied plenty of times," she said defensively, but she didn't say when. "I'm like Pepper. I just need some time to myself."

"You're going by yourself?" Grace asked, her blue eyes growing big beneath her cap of gray hair.

"Well, I'm staying at a ski resort," Roberta replied with her usual hint of sarcasm. "I assume there will be plenty of people around. It's not like I'm hiking out to a hut in the woods by myself or anything."

That conversation was strange enough, but later on in the evening I got an email from Roberta that made it even stranger:

So, Ida Mae, what do you think about the skiing idea? Actually, I didn't completely shoot straight this morning. The truth is that I'm meeting a man there. I know it sounds crazy and maybe it is. I've only been on two dates in three years and boy howdy they were both disasters, but this seems different.

Roberta was meeting a man at a ski resort? I sat staring at the computer screen trying to wrap my brain around the idea, but there was more:

Don't tell any of the other gals yet, but I met this guy through an internet dating service. Can you believe it? After all the pooh-poohing we've done about computer dating, and here I am doing it. But you know the availability of age -appropriate bachelors in Nubbins - zilch. And he is a nice guy - he's divorced, too, a history teacher at a community college, likes photography and music. And skiing, of course. His name is Brian. We hit it off on email and we've talked several times on the phone. He even makes fun of internet dating, too. We haven't met yet, since he lives three hours away, so we thought we'd meet up somewhere fun. He suggested the skiing, and I thought - why not? If I meet him and five minutes into it I decide I don't want to spend more time with him, there will be plenty of space at the resort for us to go our separate ways. And if nothing else, it gets me out of Nubbins for a few days.

My first reaction was shock. Computer dating? Then hurt. Why didn't she tell me before now? Then worry. What if this guy doesn't like Roberta, or she gets hurt? But then, resignation. Come on Ida Mae, Roberta is an adult and has a good head on her shoulders. She can handle it. And at least she's trying something new. Finally, I began to feel a little excited for Roberta.

It's true, change is hard. In fact, sometimes it stinks. But it's inevitable, just like the leaves turning gold outside my kitchen window. We can look away and pretend it's not happening or turn our face into the wind.

I typed an email to Merl:

Ever thought about going somewhere tropical for the holidays?

")