Fall Found Me Again

Last night, I got done cleaning up the kitchen after 2 days of canning (and making a mess, too), and went outside to look at the vegetable garden. It was a cool evening, the sun was going down behind the trees, and the air was a pale blue. I was in the tomatoes, picking a few that were ready, and a little breeze blew, bringing the scent of fall to me.

And all of a sudden, I was a child again, sitting in my room at my parent's house, doing my homework in the evening, at the desk in front of the window. The windows were open in my room and the crisp fall air smell came in and told me of promises of leaves turning, and the dark excitement of Halloween to come. It was that smell--that smell of the evening in fall--the one I can never seem to find here that seems to have found me. It lasted a minute. It lasted less than a minute. It was gone as fast as it came, and I didn't find it again all evening, though I tried. But it was there, for a moment, and I was back in time with it.

I know I have said that fall smells different here--it does. I miss the smell I knew. Why it brings me back to being a child, I don't know. Maybe because things were so much simpler then, though I didn't know it at the time. Maybe because it feels like a safer time. All I know is that the fall found me again last night, and it brought tears to my eyes. I was truly thankful.

It's sort of summer here again today. The heat has come back, but it's bite is gone. The leaves have continued to slowly turn. I can tell that summer is over--what comes during the days is just a shade of what it was. I am looking with excitement to the coming season. I hope you all are too.