autumn...

Autumn is my favorite season. But this has been a rather strange month for me for various reasons and there's been a hint of melancholy to the approaching season. I still love to look up on the mountainside and see the scrub oak leaves turning orange and I eagerly await the scarlet of the sumac...but it's just the tiniest bit sad to see things dying. It's sad to realize that the vibrancy is one last ditch effort before death, before the frost and bite of winter and loneliness. So I remind myself that it's just change...and change brings growth. There's beauty and wonder in the change if I choose to look for it. So I will.

I love the word autumn; I love everything about it--its letters, its length, and especially what it denotes. I can feel its crispness in the air when I say it aloud. There are a lot of things I want to do this autumn. I want to go hiking when all the leaves on the mountains have changed and the air is cool and smoky. I want to go to a corn maze at dusk, when the light is just beginning to fail. I want to carve a pumpkin and then roast the seeds. I don't even like roasted pumpkin seeds. I want to make warm, gooey pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and share them with my friends as we laugh and talk outside among the fallen leaves.