A couple of weeks ago September was swept away by a breeze of nonchalant copper leaves.
Classes officially start in beginning of September, but things don’t get serious until September fades off of the calendar. It is as if there is an unofficial grace period for the three weeks that school is in session in September.
Professors don’t assign huge projects; there are few papers due; midterms seem a million miles away. The student has just woken up from the comfortable dream of summer, warmth, shorts, flip-flops and big sunglasses.
For the month of September, we can rub our eyes and clear away the residual comfort and warm memories of the summertime. In many ways, fall ushers in this awakening.
There is something terribly sad about watching the memories of a summer disappear against the backdrop of a vast memory of experiences.
Soon, the mornings are too cold for tank tops. Hoodies reassert themselves as a staple within every wardrobe. A rainbow of scarves emerges, splashing a crowd with droplets of colour. The smell of fall begins to cling to a cool breeze — the smell of dried leaves, of bonfires, of pumpkin spice lattes, of cloves and cinnamon and of baseboard heaters, used for the first time in months.
All of a sudden, the leaves are not green anymore. The greens become oranges, which become reds and finally become dark coppery browns. These copper husks hang inside the chilly wind of fall, dancing in the air like ash or dandelion seeds.
This rusty change marks the final stages of September.
October hits like a brick wall. All of a sudden, two papers are due this Wednesday. The biology midterm is next week. The Great Gatsby needs to be read. In class, quizzes and presentations are pouncing out of nowhere.
You flip the page of your planner, and all of the scholastic responsibilities that you penciled in calmly from the syllabus three weeks earlier are staring smugly up at you, demanding your immediate attention.
How did this happen?
It was fall.
The aroma. The warm colours. Fall is the ultimate mediator between the idle summer months and the cold responsibilities of university.
Before we know it, the dancing leaves are ushering in a world of deadlines and exams. And as we frantically try to make up for lost ground, fall passes away, taking with it the dry and spicy smell, the nonchalant breeze and the comfortably passive attitude. The eye of the storm, shrouded by copper leaves, passes overhead as winter sneaks in.
