Everything Autumn

I woke up this morning to the remnants of a huge party in my back yard. Mother Nature must have hosted a welcoming celebration for autumn during the night. And as I drove to work, it appears that all of Kalamazoo was invited. Fluorescent leaves are scattered like confetti across the county, and a few trees are displaying the season’s most vibrant hues of red and orange.

For me, waking up to fall in Michigan invokes a child-like excitement similar to waking up to snow and Santa Claus on Christmas. I wondered how my obsession with this season began, so I journeyed through the autumns of my youth and a few images came to mind:

Fall is the sweet smell of the final cut of hay. It is a Harvest Moon grinning low in the sky like a giant jack-o-lantern. It is rows of golden corn crackling beneath the groan of a dusty combine.

Fall is a hayride and a bonfire. It is children running through an orchard for cider and donuts. It is a herd of ewes retreating from the pasture—their bellies bulging as they prepare to have their lambs.

Fall is the smell of a wood-burning stove. It is catching leaves as they float from the trees. It is a swinging rope hanging from the rafters—or burlap sacks of wool piled to the ceiling of our old barn.

Fall is the screams of a haunted house and the stomachache from candy corn. It is the laughter from a game of football in my grandma’s front yard. It is the memory of my grandfather’s charming face, blackened by the soot of his harvest.

Fall is the heralded “trick or treat!” The beauty of autumn arrives quickly, almost unexpectedly. And like an awe-inspiring display of fireworks, its celebration is brief. I believe Michigan may host the nation’s most beautiful finale to nature, so I always make a point to enjoy the “treat.”