Fall

I know it may still seem a little early to discuss this topic, but you can feel fall coming in the air up here. The wind blowing from the northwest has dried out, the days are getting shorter, the temperatures have dropped, the angle of the sun is different. . .

I have never been big on autumn. It has always seemed a somewhat melancholy time to me, mixed with some vague, primal urge to get everything done before winter. Plus, it seems every September I have at least one or two dreams where bells are ringing, my locker won't open, I am two days late for the test, and I didn't do my homework. Sigh.

But if fall is ever going to grow on me, it will be up here in Vermont. I know it sounds trite, but the hills really do explode once the maples turn. All the tourists come up for leaf peeping, the restaurants are full, lots of towns have some sort of foliage festival, apples and fresh cider are in season, and there is a bit of a general party atmosphere.

Actually, the party kind of stretches from the last week in September, when the leaves turn, through the first of year. After folilage is done, deer/moose/bear hunting season starts. That is when lots of people, both natives and out-of-staters, go up to their camps for about a month and "hunt". A camp can range from a busted up trailer out in the woods with no heat or running water, to a wicked nice cabin with all the bells and whistles. I am told that folks basically get all liquored up and run around in the woods in their underwear trying not to pass out, get shot, or die of exposure. And occasionally someone bags a deer.

Hunting season kind of blurs into Thanksgiving, and then into Christmas and New Years. By that time, people are just a little pooped, so everyone takes it easy, focuses on work for a month or two, while maybe mixing in a little skiing or snowshoeing or sledding.

And before you know it, it is time to start making out your seed order for the next season again.

So if I have to say goodbye to the plants soon for a little bit, I guess it won't be all that bad.