Autumn in New England:

Autumn in New England, as I came to be familiar with it, may be the most beautiful time and place on earth. The air is clean and brisk but the leaves are rich, comforting colors. Their crackle and skittering is a little fire that skips alongside you like a bearded, red and gold dachshund; never with the warmth to thaw your chapping face, but maybe enough to crack a smile. Suddenly the dark red bricks have a companion and, like the quaint, dated homes just off the street, they cease to feel so out of place.

Finally, you find reason in sitting at your second grade desk, creating a thanksgiving that could never exist in California out of thick sheets of heavy-smelling cardboard paper which never folded precisely and were less cut than rended by scissors. Looking up from your classroom job of spraying ants with Windex, you saw the window taped with unfamiliar maple leaves of unfamiliar colors slowly bleaching in the afternoon sun and were puzzled; you could never understand you were being trained for an ideal autumn. Instead you fumed at your perceived east-coast-bias of Americana as you stood at the curb in shorts and a Pokémon t-shirt, waiting for your mom’s station wagon. At dinner, finally overcome by the indignity of it all, you asked “Mommy, where the fuck is Massachusetts?” Now as you fall against the wind (finally walking like a native!) in your snug boots and coat and hat (no one ever told you ears get cold!), you taste the clean, metallic ping of the evening’s air and look up through a window at a butter colored kitchen, smelling the two old friends, cinnamon and nutmeg, waltzing again. There, alone in a little yellow island surrounded by a sea of purpley-black darkness, it starts to make sense.

During this time, the world conspires to trim its fat and everything can be heard so clearly: others, yourself, the leaves, the twiddling fingers of barren branches, the conversation from a bench (maybe it’s even your own). Experiencing the rich, indescribable beauty of your surroundings so vividly, you find tears in your eyes and, with the stinging wind serving as your trusty alibi, you can cry in oft present, rarely noticed perfection. It’s a time when you genuinely cherish the warmth of the person you’re holding, learning ever more about the spark you so dearly love. With their heat standing in such stark contrast with the cold, you stand with your back to the vast, untapped eternity that will come to define you and hold in your arms the familiar and the ever-changing moment. Weathering the two conflicting worlds crashing like waves, you open your eyes and see something, someone that can maybe be part of both.

Thick carapaces of rock that rise out from under leaves and gnarled trees, icy to the touch but too majestic not to climb. Passing Canada geese that pause, just long enough to look into your soul with their beady black eyes and say, “I will return and when I do, I will end you.” Food shared at an unfamiliar table, the room warmed by a rising familiarity and happiness, the memory tinged orange by what was a tangible comfort. Warm, dare I say it, hot apple cider graciously welcoming a full jigger of bourbon, the newcomer billowing like a curtain in two secret lover’s bedroom, while you watch, unaware of the carnal passions unfolding in front of your eyes, licking a few spilt drops from your fingers and eyeing the front door. Autumn in New England was where I found myself, where I found love, and where I found the world; so, I will always be eying my door, hoping to recognize that special time and place once again and go out searching. There must be more to find.