musings of a melancholic: fall

Showing posts with label fall. Show all posts

A new candle, letter writing, baby at my feet quietly playing with her puzzles, the sonatas of Beethoven, a husband making promising sounds in the kitchen, and a body recovering itself from illness.

I love shadows. Light gets too much attention, if you ask me.

Please enjoy your evening,

We all have our seasons, the turn of the year experienced through our senses to revive our souls and commune with Nature. Many are summer babies, happy to bask in heat and rays for hours and hours. Some crave the crush of snow under their feet and shock of Winter air on their faces. Others bloom in Spring, weeping with the cheery blossoms and swooning over jasmine.

Though I appreciate all these facets, I admit that something comes alive in me during Autumn in a different way than any other season. I am happy when I get to experience ALL the seasons (why I live in Seattle after a childhood spent enduring one-note weather in the heat of a California desert), but once the air begins to stir that Fall brew, my existence moves in to clarity. I love wrapping up in more clothing, I love having cider heated on the stove at all times, I love playing classical music throughout the day, I love lighting candles at night, I love pouring big Italian reds and standing on the porch in Joel's arms as we breath in the fragrant change. Fall makes me want to do all the things I do - write, take photos, eat delicious things, sit by a fire and ponder things.

I was reading a very enlightening essay yesterday by Pema Chodron who spoke about how it is hard to accept one of the most inevitable human eventualities - our own death. Ours personally, not death in some abstract concept. But she mentions that death happens all around us all the time. Fall is a reminder of this to me with its audacious display of decay right alongside the great harvest. The paradox is sexy.

Is this Fall, this nothing
and everything feeling, the gray
bright shadows sinking deep into the bones of my quiet house?

This morning, after I put my child down for her morning nap,
I cooked myself a big breakfast. Biscuits
Bacon, the whole lot.
I thanked Bardot and Ginger, the hens who gave me these eggs to
scramble
even though I don't believe animals have souls to thank.
Sometimes I hate being pigeonholed by beliefs. Like,
for instance, if you love animals but don't believe they have a soul.
Or if you love babies, but don't want to have any of your own
Or if you advocate for social healthcare but want to encourage self-reliance.

I've been told that when someone needs to imagine a face in their head telling them that it's okay to care for yourself, to be nice to yourself, to love yourself...that face is mine. My friends regale me with the news of personal indulgences, solitude, hot baths, an extra pour of wine, asking for help, buying a new pair of shoes. You can therefore imagine my shame when earlier this summer a new, nasty, scaring bout of self-hate made itself my companion.

I had to shop for a swim suit for camping, so I hated my body for the pregnancy. Then I hated myself for hating the pregnancy.

I had to camp, so I hated myself for all the ways camping stretches my personality. Then I hated my personality.

I had to be a mother to a new phase, so I resent my daughter for demanding of me, thinking that perhaps I didn't like her. Then I hated myself with all the hate I had in my hater for disliking my daughter. But then I knew many mothers feel this way, so I should say it for them. Then I hated myself for saying anything at all.

I had to live with family for a few days during vacation, so I felt anxious and misunderstood. Then I hated myself for anxiety and misunderstanding.

I had to speak of what I am learning regarding sexism, gender identification, and feminism, so I did so - loud and opinionated, like a child who yells before it can speak eloquently. Then I hated myself for how it ostracized people, hated myself for being a feminist.

Then I hated myself for hating all these things I usually have the power to love about myself. My body for bringing forth life and carrying me, my personality for all its strengths, my daughter for her ability to dislodge my guts, my anxiety and fear for how it introduces me to myself in new ways.

Two of my friends recently agreed that I drop wisdom bombs. I wonder where my the ability to detonate those for myself has wandered off to.

But Fall, it demands a harvest.
I am ready, I say.
I pick up my left-handed sickle and stand attention, eager for assignment.

But it's been several hours. No one stands with me, they've all been purposed.
Why wasn't I picked? Everyone else has new school clothes,
fancy trapper-keepers that smell like plastic and smarts.

So what am I do to? Give myself my own Fall purpose?
I am so tired of that.

So I ask you Fall.
Are you here to stay?
Or will that late summer Sun persist in rays of hope and energy and lazy daze?
I simply don't think I could bear it.
I've always thought Rain and Thunder were better playmates anyway.

Or perhaps this question.
Should I keep buying Rosé or move to Reds?
I kinda need to know.

The moment is over.
We are dressed now
Ready with lists and todos,
baby signs for more food
reminders to stop biting
Mama.

But this morning
before the wee productivitybug
bit,
there was something different
in the morning je ne sais quoi

A particular gorgeousness
The light both bright and dark
somehow

We are creatures
of routine.
But there was no coffee.
So I made chai. It felt weird.
Sourdough toast, a promise
to start taking it easy on the butter.

I feel the busyness of people bustling off to a new school year and I want to scream that I too am busy, productive, worth more than the dishes I do and the meals I plan and the pesto-stained babycheeks I clean. But no one cares. This is up to me, entirely my job to ascribe meaning and find avenues within this new life of motherhood to walk down and still be me at the end of it.

And to find some friggen coffee.

A nod to fall on this August Morning when the clouds brought a shower to the parched West.