This weekend, yet another seasonal change is upon us. We’ll be bidding farewell to the warm temperatures and humid nights that summer offers and welcoming in autumn’s gentle chill and visual splendor very soon. The fresh berries and crisp vegetables of summer give way to the juicy apples and hearty root vegetables of fall, just as the predominant green of the summer landscape fades to fall’s oranges, reds and golds.
Like many others, autumn is my favorite season, and I often spend most of the year—especially the hottest days of summer and the coldest days of winter—wishing that it were fall again, just so I could always be munching on some kind of apple dessert or sipping something pumpkin-flavored while curling up into a flannel shirt and crunching leaves into the sidewalk, ducking my head against a brisk breeze. (Yes, I am a bit of a romantic—what gave it away?)
I was chatting with a summer-loving friend this week who was baffled by my deep love of a season that heralds the onset of colder weather where all things green wither and die, which got me thinking about why I love fall so much. I think Edwin Way Teale’s quote above sums up my feelings perfectly. (Well, he doesn’t mention the pumpkin cheesecakes and the apple cider, but those are just cherries on top of the autumnal sundae.)
For me, fall isn’t a time to mourn the passing of warm weather and green pastures, but rather a time to celebrate the bounty of the growing season. We get together with family and friends to partake in the fruits of the growing season’s labor and put up some of the bounty for the winter, making memories all the while. As the weather cools and days get shorter, we pull together with the ones we love around the dinner table and in the kitchen.
Even though the crops, trees and greenery around us begins to bolt and go to seed, I find the metaphorical battening down of the hatches somewhat comforting: Mother Nature always knows best. Yes, we’ll have to endure a cold winter soon, but before we know it, spring will be right around the corner, and autumn’s cycle of seeding and sowing is an essential part of that. To me, the innate melancholy of fall’s dying splendor is nothing more than a (very) early harbinger of spring’s welcome mindset of growth and renewal. No other season really captures that blend of celebration and community—and pumpkin pie—like fall.
What’s your favorite thing about autumn? Share it below!
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