finding beauty in ugliness

To add to the post below, I can be thankful for the shortening and more ugly days lately. I was reading about Alain de Botton's writing room (an author that Si introduced me to as the writer of a book about architectural beauty). De Botton says that his dreary writing room increases his productivity and prompted him to write his architecture book. "My study is so ugly, it leaves me no option but to try to forget about it by escaping into my work." My Dad did his PhD in Aberdeen, Scotland, a city where academics said the weather was just nice enough to keep you from being too depressed but never nice enough to distract you from your research. It was regularly grey and dingy--and my Dad found it very conducive to study. And so I, too, can be thankful for the darkening days which focus me on my work and Ant and church and important people in our lives. I don't really like autumn or winter, so maybe I'll find more reasons to be thankful for it this year.