Cider and apples remind her of past falls

I love this time of year. It smells heavenly and the coolness of the air is refreshing after a boiling hot summer. I have an overwhelming urge to visit an apple orchard for some cider and fresh apples. But it won’t happen.
If I do buy cider it will be from a farmer’s market or it will be the overly processed stuff sold at the grocery store. Apples are the same way. I haven’t been to an actual orchard in decades. It seems pointless to go when all I want is to relive the long lost fall days when we would go down to the neighbor’s to pick a bushel or so of apples. We would carry home a couple gallons of cider that had just been made by Cliff and sold by Louise or one of their sons. If it was a good year we would be treated to some fresh honey still in the comb to go along with the apples and cider.
I am also craving a long walk in the woods. That won’t happen either. My husband’s arthritis makes walking painful and it is no fun to go without him.
As you may be able to tell I am feeling a bit wistful today. Instead of gathering apples and walking in the woods I will spend the day cleaning up the garden and bringing in the last of the houseplants. This process makes me sad because it means that the cold, dreary days of winter are coming.
I struggle to shake this feeling and remind myself to live in the moment. Today it is pretty outside. Today the air is full of swirling leaves that crunch under my feet. Today I can play in the dirt as I repot the plants that have outgrown their containers over the summer.
When I repot the plants I will be extra careful. The last time I gave something a new home I accidentally grabbed a big spider by its tummy. It startled both of us. As I was outside on the porch I quickly let it go to live out its spidery life. I think it was too surprised to bite me.
Fall is the perfect bridge between the blistering hot summer and the unknown winter. The crisp air and the clear sunshine draw us outside, away from the never-ending housework and the maddening and addicting television.
The last time I attempted to clean up one of the flowerbeds, a swirl of goldfinches descended upon the volunteer sunflowers then settled down to chastise me from the electric lines when they realized I was messing with their snacks.
The sunflowers are still standing. I have managed to pull the thistles from one bed and have an abundance of burdock yet to eliminate. This was a bad year for the gardens. The flower gardens and vegetable garden were mostly planted by Mother Nature and not me. Obviously she prefers things with stickers. Like all gardeners, my motto is, “just wait until next year.”
I hope you are enjoying the fall weather. If you get a chance I challenge you to visit an apple orchard and to take a walk in the woods. At the very least go outside and inhale the wonderful aroma of autumn.
As the poet Percy Shelley wrote, “There is a harmony in autumn, and a luster in its sky, which through the summer is not heard or seen …”
Autumn is a season to be relished. Hurry and enjoy it before it is gone.[[In-content Ad]]