Hong Kong's sticky summer is giving way to a new political season that is likely to be just as uncomfortable for Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa.
He cannot ignore the pressure to use July's mass protest as his only compass for future policy directions. But a slippery slope lies between using the summer of discontent as a valuable guide, and making all policy decisions subservient to it.
In his anxiety to demonstrate he is a changed man, Mr Tung will be tempted to sacrifice leadership to please the people. Critics will snigger that he has no leadership qualities to sacrifice. That may be true, but unless he voluntarily steps down or is removed by the leaders in Beijing - both unlikely prospects - Hong Kong is stuck with him for now. The choice, then, is to help a weak leader do his best to lead or allow him to be pulled in different directions by the competing forces of public opinion.
Most now agree the mass summer protest was more a general demonstration of dissatisfaction with the Tung administration than a specific display of anxiety over lost freedoms under proposed national security laws. Acting on that assumption, Mr Tung has retreated from Article 23 legislation to concentrate on repairing the weak economy - an issue he says the people care more about.
But Hong Kong's political opposition is reading a different message from the July protest - that the over-riding desire of the masses is immediate full democracy.
Conclusive studies are lacking on whether full democracy or a healthy economy is more important. Like other developed societies, people probably want both, and more - steady jobs, good schools, affordable health care, a clean environment and democratic freedoms they can take for granted.
That is a tall order, but one that leaders of democracies and near democracies like Hong Kong are expected by the people to deliver. It is clear from the July 1 protest that the people feel Mr Tung has not delivered what is expected of him. The big unknown is: can the political opposition, in its present form, do any better?