The Book of Autumn

It's so beautiful in the fall. Judging by the size of my photo files for September, it's my favourite month.

Drinking in the richness of leaves in transition, hues of gold, violet, cranberry. The sunsets missed through the long days of summer, flaring streaky over cobalt-shadowed landscape. Harvest haze of wheat chaff, farmers haloed in the glare of combine lights. I love the swirl of leaves as we meander down aspen-lined country roads, and the sleepy trickle of creeks banked with tangled purple-red cranberry bushes.

Autumn has been long been used as a metaphor for ending, the slow closing of a life-book. But I think autumn is a celebration of the generosity and abandon of summer. It's a season set apart for memory and gratitude, a space to take a breath and savour all that has passed. To make that entry in memory's diary and sign it with a flourish.

If summer was a party, fall is a meditation.