This week: summer’s last hurrah?

In the midst of the last weekend of summer, 2021, we’re looking back at a season full of smoke and heat and rain and clouds. Wednesday will mark the beginning of full-fledged autumn, when astronomical autumn joins the meteorological season in progress. Our local Equinox falls at 2:21 pm CDT. The technician arrives on Monday to check the furnace for the heating season. Leaves are both changing colors and dropping from the trees. The drive is covered in acorns. Tomorrow the high temperature is forecast to approach 90℉. Tuesday and the rest of the week: mostly in the mid-60’s. Minnesota usually delivers a much better autumn than it does spring. We’re looking forward to enjoying our favorite season.

signs of the season: autumn leaves

Photo by J. Harrington

Our summer hasn’t been terrible, nor has it been great. It’s been, with the exception of watching a granddaughter grow from infant to toddler, largely boring, not counting the occasional severe thunderstorm or tornado warning. Minimizing exposure to COVID-19 explains much of what hasn’t happened. The aforementioned crappy weather of drought or downpour accounts for much of the rest of a personally sedentary season. Getting older and wiser, or more lazy, explains a lot of the rest. My tolerance for getting all sweaty has dropped a lot. We’ve not tried to play with the local trout because of their potential for heat stress and our aversion to very high water. We hope the turning of the seasons will bring better days.

Merry Autumn

Paul Laurence Dunbar - 1872-1906

It’s all a farce,—these tales they tell

     About the breezes sighing,

And moans astir o’er field and dell,

     Because the year is dying.

 

Such principles are most absurd,—

     I care not who first taught ’em;

There’s nothing known to beast or bird

     To make a solemn autumn.

 

In solemn times, when grief holds sway

     With countenance distressing,

You’ll note the more of black and gray

     Will then be used in dressing.

 

Now purple tints are all around;

     The sky is blue and mellow;

And e’en the grasses turn the ground

     From modest green to yellow.

 

The seed burrs all with laughter crack

     On featherweed and jimson;

And leaves that should be dressed in black

     Are all decked out in crimson.

 

A butterfly goes winging by;

     A singing bird comes after;

And Nature, all from earth to sky,

     Is bubbling o’er with laughter.

 

The ripples wimple on the rills,

     Like sparkling little lasses;

The sunlight runs along the hills,

     And laughs among the grasses.

 

The earth is just so full of fun

     It really can’t contain it;

And streams of mirth so freely run

     The heavens seem to rain it.

 

Don’t talk to me of solemn days

     In autumn’s time of splendor,

Because the sun shows fewer rays,

     And these grow slant and slender.

 

Why, it’s the climax of the year,—

     The highest time of living!—

Till naturally its bursting cheer

     Just melts into thanksgiving.

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