Another Autumn

Here we are at the beginning of fall once again. Or autumn, if you prefer. I prefer fall. As long as I don’t actually fall.. Because that might be embarrassing.

And depending on when you read this, it may not actually be fall quite yet. Fall starts on Sunday, September 22, 2012. Or at least that is what I found when I did a Google search. Google found it, so it must be true, right?

Even though fall is about to start, to me the summer ended over a month ago. Why then? Because that was when school started back. I haven’t been in school for almost 20 years myself, but my wife is a teacher and my son is a student, so in many ways I feel like I am still in school, too, because so much of our lives revolve around school stuff in our house. Sure, the temperatures were still in the upper 90s for several weeks, and the calendar still said summer, but I knew that summer was over, because we couldn’t do any of those typical summer things. Except cut the grass. But that was only because we had to because it was still growing. All the other summer activities - sleeping later, relaxing nights at home, swimming, vacations, and whatever else - ended once the first day of school got underway.

So summer - my favorite season of the year - is, or has been, over. But really, I don’t mind all that much. Because as it turns out, fall is my second favorite. As much as I love the hot weather of summer and hate being cold, I don’t mind the change in seasons that fall brings. I don’t mind getting my jacket and my hat out of the closet. I don’t mind the changing colors of the trees, or the long shadows caused by the afternoon sun. I don’t mind football games. I don’t look forward to getting cold once late fall and winter get here, but the other things aren’t that bad.

One nice thing about fall for me is that as the daylight hours start to decrease, our routine often seems to slow down just a little. We will still be going to Jaylin’s football practices until the end of the football season, but they start finishing earlier in the evening because they run out of light. Or if I am home, there isn’t time to even start cutting the grass that is still growing, because darkness will arrive before I have a chance to finish.

So hello, fall! Thanks for bringing a change to the air, and a change to the colors, and a change to our schedule! Just please keep winter at bay for as long as possible.