Windfall | An Autumn Compendium for Wandering Minds

There's an old word for the fruit that falls on its own. Nobody had to climb for it or shake the branch. It was just lying there in the grass one morning, waiting for someone to notice.

That word is windfall, and it's the name of something I've been making for a long while.

Windfall is an autumn compendium for wandering minds. It's part journal, part field guide and part almanac, 238 pages across fifteen sections, made to be printed and written in by hand through the whole turning of the year.

Some of it is practical. There are daily pages and weekly spreads, habit trackers and a dopamine menu, and time savers for the days your attention runs off in six directions before breakfast.

Some of it is for slowing down. There's a wander book for walks, with pages for birds and bark and whatever the wind brings down. There are hearth recipes and an apple and pear log for tasting slowly. There's a curiosity cabinet for the rabbit holes you never have time to follow.

And some of it is very old. The feasts and customs of the turning year are here, the Norse and Gaelic ones from Michaelmas to Martinmas, the days our grandmothers' grandmothers marked by the weather and the table.

I made it for the kind of person who starts ten notebooks and finishes none. Nothing in it asks you to be consistent, only to come back when you can. Print one page or print them all. Print the same page every week if it serves you.

If you can, go out and find a windfall today. A fallen leaf the color of a ripe persimmon is plenty.