Where I live the weather can be tempestuous. We have a saying: “If you don’t like the weather,wait 5 minutes”. Sometimes the seasons are just as fickle as the weather. Spring will arrive in a day, summer will stretch into October, fall’s glory will be a few short weeks before winter stomps on it’s heels. The dance of the seasons. It’s how we mark time. 
This year it appears that Autumn has decided to lay claim to summer’s end. A series of cold wet storms has caused the earth cool and a bite is in the morning air. The typical dryness and warmth that one enjoys in the summer living in the high desert has succumbed to fall’s call.
I write this at 5 am on a chilly Saturday morning. Thunder and lightening woke me up. The wind blows and I think of the wet patriotic bunting I have hanging on my porch, and how silly I was thinking I would keep it up until labor day. Then I remember a short poem I wrote years ago:
Of summer’s angry dew the wind yawning warns,
of autumn’s raging tempests. ‘Tis the changing of the storms.
I wrote that poem while I was living in Phoenix, an area that seasons do not change dramatically. Pretty much it’s hot, hotter, hottest and less hot. While living there I missed the seasons. Seasons mark time. They make you feel the progress of the year. They call to mind buried memories. The hold us accountable for the year spent.
While some might morn the short passing of summer, I relish it. I love sweaters, changing leaves, cold mornings with warm blankets, soup, pumpkins, and all the wonderful coming holidays. Autumn is my favorite season. It reminds me of the my childhood days in Wisconsin, the starting of the new school year, carving pumpkins with family, Halloween costumes, hayrides, apple picking, Thanksgiving, and crunching leaves underfoot.
Welcome old friend, I’ve missed you. What new memories will I make with my children during your stay with us? What will unfold during these next few months? Your dramatic entrance this morning has stirred me awake.
Autumn, I am happy you’re here.
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