Issue #78 Is this the most melancholic time of year?

The slow descent from summer into autumn

Is this the most melancholic time of year? The slow descent from summer into autumn. I don’t know why but I feel an aching in my heart as the light grows ever more golden and spider’s webs glisten in the early morning dew. A complex mix of nostalgia and longing. I wonder, have these webs been here all along? Are there more spiders in autumn or is it just easier to spot their silken threads? I could probably find out the answer, but I don’t want to know, I am content with the mystery.

The chill morning air reminds me of the slow reluctant shuffle back to school after the summer holidays. A forced return to structure and reality. I re-live the whole experience vicariously as the school holidays end for Benji.

The end of summer seems like a more significant marker of the passing of time than any other point in the year - another chance to live our best lives slips away, like liquid gold running through our fingers. Did we make the most of it? Did we grasp the opportunity with enough enthusiasm?

This particular summer, opportunities were scant so perhaps we can cut ourselves a little slack. Characterised by wet and wind it has largely felt like a slighter warmer extension of winter. We had high hopes. We yearned for warmth and sun after months of the wettest winter on record. We find ourselves still yearning. Perhaps this one feels more melancholic than most - it has been and gone without ever arriving in the first place. Still, there have been moments, fleeting days of summer goodness, just often enough to know that we will miss it when it’s gone.

There is something hopeful about autumn too. In the same way that spring is a sign of renewal, autumn marks the end of one thing and the beginning of another. It feels like a time for creativity, for plotting, scheming and planning adventures. It is time to head back into the woods for a new cycle of cutting and regeneration. It is perhaps the most aesthetically pleasing season - already birches are tinged with yellow and geulder rose berries, hips and haws all glow ruby red in the hedgerows. Soon green will yield to bronze, copper and gold as leaves senesce and are cast adrift, swirling and fluttering to the ground in riotous displays of colour and motion. The fruiting bodies of the fungi that have been there all along will start to blossom. And there’s the light, the glorious September light, softer now as the sun wheels ever lower across the sky.

There are some that seem to relish the arrival of autumn. They are ready for summer to end. They talk of sweater weather and cosy evenings. I am guessing these are people who don’t work outside. As a student of Nature’s teachings, I can find things to appreciate in all the seasons, but there’s no doubt the shorter days make things a little harder physically and emotionally. And after autumn, we all know what comes next and I’m just not sure I’m ready for that yet.

On the last day of August, as if to say, here’s a taste of what you will be missing all winter, we were graced with a final day of warm summer sunshine. It was a day to do nothing much in particular, but to simply soak in the last of the season’s goodness, swimming in deep pools, hanging hammocks by the water’s edge, studying the details of plant and rock which seemed to suddenly be infused with greater clarity by the way the late summer sun hits the earth.

There’s still a couple of weeks left until autumn begins  (although the phenological signs tell me that it is here already) and it looks like we have a few more warm and sunny days to come - a parting gift from the universe? Maybe, maybe not, but we’ll take it.

Here’s to the end of summer, such as it was, and to the coming of autumn - may it deliver a bountiful harvest!

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Well, that’s all for this week. We hope you enjoy these last few moments of summer and that autumn gives you reasons to be thankful and hopeful.

With warmest wishes,

Andrew, Emma and Benji

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