Articulating Autumn

In an attempt to 'see [...] feelingly' (as Shakespeare once said), and in response to Robert Macfarlane's push for a renewed linguistics around landscape (see my October book recommendations for more context), I will use this space to try and articulate the season we have come to know as autumn.

Autumn is a liminal season, a balance between two extremes. A kind of decay, but a kind of new beginning too. A chance to start fresh, bare. A sudden lungful of colder, clearer air. A fleeting moment of clarity before the winter fog. Warm colours laugh in the face of the impending cold. Greyness slowly descends, enveloping the landscape like a fine mist.

Autumn, like its opposite, spring, is a symbol of transition. The warm, expansive security of a long summer trickles away. This is the beauty and downfall of our country's seasons: just as we take something for granted, it is no more. Leaves shrivel, fall, crunch, and decay. The wind whips the branches into a vigorous dance, reminding them of their ultimate fragility. Trees enter survival mode, and so do we. They shudder, sigh, shed an unnecessary layer. Summer is a season of exuberance, excess and plenty; winter is its bare bones.

Autumn is a reminder of the oxymoronic; a constant, permanent cycle of change. But this cycle is under threat, its impermanence is a subconscious reminder of our wider weaknesses. A planet in distress. We bemoan the change, but we also take it for granted. Can we, like it, continue to change our ways?

Autumn and winter make me go inwards. They are cold, unsociable and unforgiving, but this makes me grateful too. It makes me grateful for the cold, bright, sharp sun on a rare blue-skied day. It reminds me that even when a whole species is in stasis, nature forges on.