I haven't had an autumn since 2009, just before I moved to the US. There's no real autumn in Los Angeles, since those palm trees never shed their leaves. I might start wearing a coat in the evenings, but that's about it. No leaf-kicking, bobble-hat-wearing walks there.
Manhattan, I had thought, would offer us a proper Fall. Instead we just lurched from a hot, humid summer into a brutally cold winter - with a couple of bipolar weeks in between. I remember a snow storm at the end of October, when earlier that same week I'd been out with bare arms. At least we did get to see a few pumpkins, and the seasonal display at Rabbit Hutch Towers was quite autumnal, but that was it.
Last year in London autumn started straight after spring, sometime in mid July. It was hard to really get excited about it since there was no sense of seasons changing: it was just a year of endless chilly rain. We did have a nice apple harvest, but that alone does not an autumn make.
This year, after a summer of long, sunny days and bright blue skies, eating outside and actually needing sunscreen, autumn makes sense. This year's harvest (from my parents' garden) knocks last year's into a cocked hat. A couple of stormy nights have brought branches down in the Valley Gardens, giving my runs a nice cross country vibe. We had spaghetti bolognese for dinner last night, the first time I've craved something warming and hearty since May. And as I type this I feel, for the first time in months, the need to put socks on. The thrill of it!
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| Harvest time - Autumn 2013 |
I suppose I can indulge my love of this time of year even more than usual. After all, we'll be in sunny LA before the dark afternoons and grey mornings get monotonous.
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