Hints of Autumn

Summer is far from over. February is usually the month of little sleep, as the gale-force summer wind dies down and oppressive heat sets in. The Cape is brown and dry (well, greyish black where the all-consuming fires have ravaged the landscape - including a 500 square kilometre area over the mountains). The summer blooms have long wilted, and leaves drop one by one from my mulberry tree. Narrowly avoiding my morning coffee cup...

This morning though I woke up to a whiff of Autumn. For the first time in ages there was dew on the grass and on the car. A slight chill in the air, moisture replacing dry heat. My outdoors breakfast felt cooler than normal, the sun at a different angle as it starts heading north to hide behind the mountain for the colder months.

Although I love both summer heat and winter cold-cuddly-rain weather, I think I enjoy Spring and Autumn the most. Those inbetween times. Spring's bursting life and greenery everywhere. Autumn's mist and slow bedding down of the world to rest.

Our lives no longer follow the seasons as our ancestors' did. We eat summer tomatoes in the dead of winter (although at a price). Central heating and cooling (for the lucky) keep our temperatures at a constant level. Our food sources are so far away that we have no need to watch the seasons, plant our crops, or harvest them at precisely the right time. For us the sun comes up, goes down, days pass - and we barely notice those subtle changes that differentiate our seasons.

Perhaps with my desire to live in harmony with the earth, to find balance and rhythm, my senses are more in tune with the world around me. Perhaps it's just the way I was raised - to live close to nature and notice what she does. Whatever it is, the first hint of Autumn this morning had me drawing deep breaths of fresh cool air, feeling a ripple of pleasure on my skin in the cool of a new day.