Figuring Out Fall

Fall is that season that has created a love/hate relationship with us humans.  She doesn't do it intentionally or spitefully.  It is just one of those things. It happens.

Me?  Me, I love Fall.  I love all her beauty and grace.  I have pondered my love affair with Fall for quite some time.  Why she intrigues me so. Why she makes me feel the way she does.  I think I have come to some kind of conclusion.  I think. 

There is something about a season that can transition from a sweltering, sticky day into a cool, breezy one.  And then back again.  She will tease you with her coolness.  She will delight you with her colors.  And she will toy with your nostalgic side with her smells. She seems to do all this so subtly and effortlessly but with a calculated purpose. 

Her breath of cool air is much welcomed after smoldering temperatures have left us drained.  Her breezes seem to ease the tension gently from our bodies.  We too, can breathe. Regroup. She gives us warm days into cool nights and cool days into cold nights.  She prepares us for Winter.
 
Her colors are always s sight to behold.  She may move in quickly to change the landscape to her liking ~ seemingly working in the dark of night, that we may awaken to suddenly see a new world out our windows.  Or she may take her time to nonchalantly add a splash here or a dab there, gently easing into her vibrant, flashy raiment.

She has the power through her ability to change the landscape to cause us to reflect into our past, ponder our present and wonder about our future. 

Her colors are but, as they say, as season.  Soon the wind will blow a fire-y rainfall of leaves across the ground.  Unlike the wet stuff, the leaves gently swirl, drift, lift and land where they please.  Their gentle, breezy ballet is mesmerizing, causing one to daydream, stop and stare or frolic in the midst of them. 

The smells that come with fall are like a favorite blanket that not only keeps you warm, but affords you a safe place to ponder your thoughts, snuggled in, smelling the warmth of the fabric, feeling the textures of the cloth, protecting you from yourself.  That. Is.  Fall.  Your mind settles in, triggered by the smells she sends through the air, across the ground, up from the chimneys, in the early mornings, and the late of nights.  Memories and hopes arise from smelling the wispy, swirling vapor from the chimneys, observing the textures of the leaves and foliage, breathing in their musky smell kissed by the morning sun or chilled by the evening dew. 

It would be a harsh awakening moving from Summer into Winter without Fall.  She transitions us whether we like it or not.  I personally love it. I love her. 

Fall.