Not To Alarm You, But…

The other night, getting ready for bed, I caught a whiff of the air outside the open window and.. it smelled like autumn.

Now y’all who’ve known me a while are aware that autumn is not a season I celebrate. In fact, other than the dismissal of hot-sweaty weather, I have always found autumn to be at best distasteful and at worst a panic-inducing precursor to “depression season”. The Season of Death. The season of misery. The season where I wish to hibernate and avoid eye contact.

And yet, as I brushed my teeth, I felt a tiny quiver of excitement.

That’s right. EXCITEMENT.

ABOUT AUTUMN.

One could credit the return of school – the kids heading away from the house for HOURS at a time! without me! leaving me alone! – and perhaps the purchase of school supplies in great quantities helped me. Stationery is ALWAYS an upper, after all, and having some fresh Sharpies and a new notebook is about the same as injecting some sort of upper directly into my veins.

But my mind started leaping from those hours (alone! in the house! no kids!) while the kids are in school to the idea of wearing my hoodies again to the idea of Rockton Fair to the idea of Thanksgiving stuffing to the idea of cool breezes… and I felt GOOD.

REALLY good.

Hold me, please, because I am frightened.

And really looking forward to autumn.