October 27, 2010

Now It Is Fall

It finally smells of fall here this week. For weeks it has been fall, I know. The colder weather, sometimes dropping down low enough to leave the beginnings of frost on the leaves in the morning, has said that fall is here. The knitting on my lap - Briton's socks, which are coming along way faster than anything I've made so far - fall, fall, fall. The tights and wool skirts and fleece jackets, all say fall. The leaves on the trees, and now more often on the ground, yellow, scarlet, rust colored, they say fall too.
But some how it hasn't really felt like fall yet. And then, as I walked home from dropping Evie off at school, I passed my favorite tree, a gnarled old maple a few blocks form out house, and it smelled like fall.
This is my favorite time of year for walks. Walks down the street, up in the hills, around town. Walks anywhere. It's not too hot or too cold, it might be a little muddy, but a pair of wellies takes care of that.
We've on plenty of walks in the past few weeks. Been back to our favorite spots, some that we hadn't seen all summer due to the heat and then the breaking down of the car.But this was the first walk of the fall where I could smell it in the air. It must be the maple trees that do it. The bright yellow leaves piled up, wet and bright on the ground, slowly drying up and decaying (but in a nice way!)