The autumn arriving. The winter system it's time to design.

Victor wrote two weeks ago about the biology of what happens next — the circadian system adjusting, the mornings getting harder, the three minutes of morning light that helps. Marian wrote last week about the supermoon and the rituals we didn't plan. What I want to write about is the system.

Because autumn — more specifically, the transition into the dark months — is when our screen usage patterns in this family break. Not dramatically. But predictably. Every year, around October, I notice the same thing: the phones are out more in the evenings. The television is on more in the afternoons. The children are inside more, seeking the quick comfort of a screen rather than the slower comfort of something else.

This is not a character failure. It is a seasonal pattern. And seasonal patterns, unlike character failures, can be managed with a system.

The winter system in our family has three components, developed through several years of trial and error. The system is not strict. It is structural.

I build the winter system in autumn rather than waiting for December because by December the erosion is already well underway. The time to establish a structural pattern is before the conditions that undermine it have arrived.