The feel and smell of autumn are in the air (09/11/06)

The calendar is wrong. Autumn has arrived. It began by teasing us with cool nights only to hide behind the last of sweltering summer by midmorning. Squash has begun inhabiting roadside produce stands. Rosy, fresh tomatoes are met with groans when they make their nightly appearance on the supper table. Flower bulbs are beginning to fill the aisles of the plant store with promises of spring on their packages. Mailboxes are giving birth to litters of Christmas catalogs.

These are all signs that the seasons are changing, but the one thing that tells me it isn't summer anymore is the smell in the air. Fall's distinctive perfume is a blend of apple cider and a new box of crayons. It smells like gardens overflowing with bloated, yellowish cucumbers and crisp carrots. Oh, wait. I can't be smelling carrots. Even though I planted a half a bed full of them only one grew. One. One carrot. So let me revise that last sentence to read . . . "bloated, yellowish cucumbers, one lonely carrot and a whole bunch of sunflowers."

Fall has an urgency to it. Now is the time to kick through the leaves. Well, maybe not right now as the leaves are still on the trees. But as soon as they detach themselves and turn crackly then is the time to kick through them.

Where was I? Oh, yeah, urgency. There is energy in the air that tells us we need to get busy and quit putting off all those summer projects that we avoided because it was too hot and muggy. If we don't harvest that one carrot then it will soon be too late as the bunnies will have eaten it like they ate all but three of the green beans I planted. Apparently it was a good year for the bunnies.

The sweetness of the autumn air beckons us outside to enjoy Mother Nature in all her glory before she throws a hissy fit and dumps ice and snow all over the place. The perfume that permeates the air is a sign that warns us to get our dwellings prepared for the winter while we can. It whispers in our ears and retells us the old story about the grasshopper and the ant. It calls us outdoors to inspect any damage done by summer storms and reminds us how lucky we are that we only have to deal with ice storms and tornados as we watch programs on the lasting effects of last year's hurricanes.

In the background of the energizing autumn air is another odor. It is faint and it is new. It is the memory of what has become known as 9/11, when the infidels had the audacity to attack us on our own soil. Oh, wait, we are the infidels. Sometimes I get confused.

As horrific as that day was, I think that we, as a nation, were even more horrified and astonished to learn that not everybody likes us. Not everybody wants to emulate us and that some people actually revile us and want to kill us. How can that be? We are supposed to be the good guys. It makes us uneasy to know that the world doesn't always agree that our way is the best. The odor of fear and uneasiness is also in the air.

Then the breeze changes and we push bad memories away as we enjoy the warm caress of the air that urges us to turn off the television and other electronic slave-masters and wend our way out of the house to enjoy the feel of grass on our bare feet. It persuades us that cleaning up the flower and garden beds is an enjoyable way to spend an afternoon or evening. The crispness of the air gives us renewed energy after the lethargy of summer.

For me, the air not only smells different for each season, it feels different. Summer air is heavy and thick. Spring air is thin and compelling. Winter air is sharp and foreboding. But autumn air is both soft and crisp, cool and light. It is perfect for strolling through the woods or even for delivering newspapers; any excuse to not be indoors.

When I go outside these days the air feels and smells like autumn. This is reinforced by the golds and purples of wild flowers and the reminders of Septembers past when peacefulness was hard to find.

The calendar is wrong. Autumn is here. Go outside and you will find it.[[In-content Ad]]