Beyond pumpkins and autumn leaves
I adore the Autumn season. I love all the typical things that symbolise the time of year (at least here in the Northern Hemisphere): pumpkins, changes in foliage, swapping over the clothes at the front of my wardrobe to include wooly sweaters and scarves, cooking more soups and stews, and even enjoying the growing chillier weather. (Sending patience and love to my friends in the far west and southern regions of the US who are instead enduring heat waves and/or hurricanes of climate-changing proportions.)
But I also have been thinking about the lesser mentioned signs that the seasons are changing. To me these are just as evocative at signalling we have left summer behind and the ho-ho-ho’s of carols will be with us soon.
I was reminded of this as we drove to the middle of the island to do a couple of errands and during our 20 minute drive, we encountered four giant tractors at different places lumbering slowly under the weight of their large trailers filled with various agricultural products.
I imagined that these containers likely included corn, cabbage, cauliflower, leeks, tomatoes, garlic, or any of the other produce grown on the island that is ready to be harvested this time of year. The trailers were closed; this is a rainy country after all, and the produce needs to be protected so I could only guess. Possibly the trailer was filled with manure or other ‘waste’ material that is being turned into something else useful. Hay and the other grains have been harvested already, wound into bales and covered in plastic sitting proudly in fields all around the Island.
The corn fields we drove past this day had been partially harvested: stalks were chopped leaving rows of remaining two-foot high sticks standing askew in the chocolate brown soil. This stick-scape surrounded another few acres of densely planted corn still standing tall, waiting it’s turn to be harvested.
When I lived in California, the trailers filled with produce were always open topped and you could see the tomatoes, heads of lettuce, peaches, artichokes, corn, etc. being hauled in single and sometimes double-trailers down the highways. It made me a tiny bit giddy knowing that the food grown in my state was headed across the country and sometimes around the world.
Another sign of autumn here on the Island is we are now in the ‘Can’t drive’ season. This follows the busy summer, ‘Shouldn’t Drive’ season, when there are so many people visiting the island and so much traffic that you really shouldn’t drive. ‘Can’t drive’ is the name my other half has called the time of year when it is very difficult to take the usual route to get where you want to go. This is the time of year when our Island Roads Department gets their work done. And by work, I mean putting up diversion signs, digging up random bits of road and pavement/sidewalk here and there, and installing temporary traffic lights. It seemed like only yesterday we were still in the Shouldn’t Drive season and then—this week!—it is road diversion time again.
For our daily walk we cover a two or three mile loop that encompasses the beachfront esplanade. Year round we silently note the tourist traffic and observe the numbers, ages, region or country of origin, types of food consumed, what kinds of dogs they have, and other fun-facts. Of course we infer all this from the clothes they are wearing, any conversations we overhear and, in summer, the level of pink their skin has turned. Once school goes back in the UK, the numbers of tourists drops and shifts. So this is another signal that autumn is coming: we now have more adults-only groups, big coaches/buses at the hotels, and we hear more foreign voices too. But fewer people overall.
Another different sign of autumn is when the reminders for annual flu and covid jabs/shots start arriving. Luckily for me, both my pharmacy and my doctors surgery send me text messages telling me when and how to sign up to get mine. At this point I am halfway along, opting to get them on two different days this year as I tend to react to one or the other. So far I have had a mild reaction to the flu jab; hopefully that means the Covid one will not be a problem (fingers crossed). Still, I have no complaints if I suffer a few days of slight symptoms rather than the full-blown malady of either.
One last autumn association: when I was a kid, we only had broadcast television stations, and the choice of only a half-dozen stations. Way back then, autumn was the start of the ‘New Season’ following a summer of reruns. New series would begin, old favourites would start up again, and you would have to plan your schedule very carefully to make sure you were there to watch the specific shows when they came on. There was no recording, or streaming shows when you wanted. Imagine!
I’ve noticed some of the streaming services are also now launching their more popular series in the autumn again; it is a sweet throwback for some of us. In the UK, autumn broadcast television is traditionally heralded by two popular reality shows: Strictly Come Dancing, which runs until Christmas and The Great British Bake off. We don’t watch broadcast TV live, but Pete’s mum usually has on one of the Strictly follow-up interview shows when we arrive with dinner mid-week, so we are aware it is on, and therefore it must be autumn.
Most importantly at this time of year, I am enjoying the slower pace, the time to notice things, rather than being so busy DOING things. Or maybe it is that the ‘doing things’ seems more measured, with time to observe and breathe more deeply. Whatever it is, I am happy to enjoy this here-we-are time of year for awhile.
For you all: do you have non-traditional triggers that make you aware the autumn season is here or close to? Are there special things you cook, or wear, or like to do? Do you spend more time outside or inside? How about watching those new TV series? I’d love to hear what you are all up to!
Thanks as always for reading, and sharing your thoughts if you wish!
xx Sabrina
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In Australia and New Zealand, there is no such thing as "fall" (it is called autumn). Moreover, the native podocarp trees are not deciduous, so "fall" colors are only to be found in pockets of exotic trees. Here in Wellington at latitude 41° S. (i.e., in the "Roaring Forties"), the equinoctial periods feature especially strong and frequent gales. They can be wearing. Perhaps this is also the case on the Isle of Wight. But I enjoy autumn for many of the same reasons that you do. As our fruit and vegetables are mostly grown locally, and there are few imports (especially from the northern hemisphere), the harvest time is celebrated in full measure. We savor the short-lived things like summer fruits and berries, fresh chilies, zucchini (here called courgettes) and eggplant (aubergine) before the winter sets in, and they become unavailable, or nearly so. In winter, root vegetables, squash and leafy "silverbeet" figure large.
Lovely lovely post, with a real sense of a season's turn.
I'm with you.
Love harvesting the produce, cooking with it, freezing the food for winter sustenance, love the colours, the cooler nights when bed becomes a warm hobbit hole. Wearing warmer clothes and LOVE the way the incomers vanish and the coast returns to us. Selfish I know, but one can actually see the wildlife emerge, the dolphins and sea eagles, the little coastal birds - all reclaiming what is rightfully theirs much more than ours.
If there's anything that's a bugbear, its raking up the multitude of leaves off the lawns. It's mammoth. I tend to leave any that fall on the garden beds as ready-made compost.
Besides, when all is said and down, we know that seasons roll around with beautiful regularity and there's comfort in that ancient ritual.