As I look out the window next to my cubicle I see a beautiful scarlet maple almost completely red. It’s a small tree and it grows in the back parking lot of my workplace. It’s the only tree that I can see from my view that is turning. Fall seems to be coming later to this area. It’s the middle of October and I’m missing the colors.
It seems that fall is much different here in Tennessee than it is in Northern IN. In Indiana, I remember feeling autumn come on slowly, even gracefully. You’d see the fields dry up and the nights would get cooler. Occasionally you’d see frost on the ground or on your car. Your breath was visible during the earliest and latest hours of the day. And the trees would gradually turn brilliantly beautiful hues of crimson, scarlet, gold, amber, yellow and brown, and then shed their leaves as if performing the most beautiful ballet- each one perfectly timed.
In Nashville, especially this year, the summer has held its grip far too long- not wanting to let go. The heat finally conceded to welcome in a much-needed cooler week, but summer hasn’t given up entirely. It’s like a teeter-totter going up & down; cool, then almost too warm. And the trees seem to be resisting as well. Perhaps after being nearly frozen to death in the spring, and practically dying of drought later in the summer they figure “Hey man, I’m going to stay green as long as I can! How could you deny me that?” With those conditions I wonder if we’ll even have a fall at all.
And really, I have to wonder if what has really changed has been me. In Indiana life was slower. I lived in the country all of my life, except for my college years, and the views were spectacular. Maybe fall means even more because the farm that we rented only had 1 deciduous tree- a very young sugar maple. The rest of the trees were cragly, old cedar trees and every year it seemed we’d lose another one to a winter storm. We had a big yard and only one tree that changed. So I watched other trees on the bus, and I watched the trees as we rode to church. Along all the beautiful roads I would see God’s nature displayed gloriously.
Even in college, the campus had the most beautiful, huge trees- many close to a hundred years old. They covered the small campus. No wonder I connected with this school. There was a big hill near the library that my friends and I rolled down in the fall. It was a blast. But there haven’t been any days of rolling down the hills since I’ve moved to Nashville. You won’t often walk though a big pile of fallen leaves; the yard services aren’t being paid for that. In fact, I don’t even have a yard (well, not much of one). Not that I’d have time to do it even if I did. By the time I get home it’s nearly dark and in a week or two it will be completely dark.
I mentioned a couple of weeks ago how we went to Clarksville to enjoy a Fall festival and how it was a bust. When it’s 90 degrees outside it hardly feels like fall. Well, this weekend we’re trying again….hopefully. The Ellington Agricultural Center in Nashville, which I drive through as a short-cut everyday, is having their annual Music & Molasses Festival this weekend. It sounds as if it could be fun. And the weather should be a little more fall-ish. Perhaps after spending sometime really celebrating fall I will feel more like I used to when I was back home in Indiana.
