This Fall... 2012

Fall 2012.

This year, for the first time, I have found myself anticipating and enjoying fall. Could this be a sign that I am, myself, becoming older and calmer and more serene? 

This year, for the first time in my life, I couldn't wait for fall to arrive! Yet, all of my life, up until now, fall has always been my least favourite season: Its arrival inevitably brought with it feelings of sadness and boredom. In contrast to summer-- the time of fun-- in my mind, fall has always been associated with bleak, gloomy, monotonous days.

But this year, quite surprisingly, the arrival of fall has brought about completely different feelings! This fall has been all about a sense of peace and relief from the hot and fast-paced summer days. And I have been waiting for that! Finally, as the weather got cooler and the leaves began to turn various shades of red and yellow, I felt a huge sense of content and a kind of peaceful happiness..

Fall was always my grandmother's favourite season. She found summer tiring, even exhausting and always waited for the arrival of the temperate and subdued days of the fall... As a child, I could never understand her. (My favourite time of year, in those days, was late spring and summer.) In fact, I thought my grandmother had to be joking whenever she expressed her dislike for the summer season: How can one not enjoy the sun, the brightness and the energy that it brings? It is the time of year when one can finally cast all the heavy, warm layers of clothing and feel alive and free! My grandmother would reply that I could not understand her because I was still so young, and that, when I'd get older, I would most likely see how she felt. I told her that would never happen. 

This was many years ago, and my grandmother has since passed away. But, many years later, at the arrival of this fall, having caught myself for the first time anticipating and enjoying this season, I vividly recalled my grandmother's own particular appreciation of it. For the first time in my life, I now find myself feeling exactly the way my grandmother had described.. Now, I think I understand. Summer has its fun moments, but its heat and its general energy does get tiring after a while, and it is only now that the calm and the subdued ambience of fall has settled in that I feel truly happy and at peace with myself... Could this, then, be a sign that I am finally getting older, calmer, more temperate and poised?