The wind blew strong, and summer's song, it fades to memory...

No-one ever wished anyone else a merry autumn. The words just do not go together. Autumn…is a strange beast to me. I know that almost everyone else (northern hemisphere everyone else, at least) has commented on it on their blogs lately, and I swore I wouldn’t follow suit because I dislike even really deigning to notice autumn. But I want to know what it is about the season that seems to captivate people so.

Spring I understand, to a certain extent. The joy of seeing the first snowdrop, the buds on the trees…beginning to remember what it’s like to actually feel any warmth from the sun. Summer…basking in that warmth, the sheer joy that comes from blue skies and wisps of white cloud, and the colour abounding everywhere. Deepest winter…there’s a thrill to it. The ferocity of the cold, the unforgiving beauty of ice and snow, the knowledge that this is as bad as it gets but you can survive it and toast your feet by the fire.

But autumn…mists and mellow fruitfulness? Perhaps, but to me that is more late summer. By the time the leaves drop, the last fruit is long gone. And mist is pretty, yes, but fog is not. The leaves turning can be beautiful, but unless you’re very lucky they don’t last long on the ground before the rain turns them into yucky brown mush. And even if not, all you’re left with are bare branches against a grey skyline. The clear, crisp days are pretty, but seem washed-out and far too short in comparison to the lazy summer days still recent in your memory – they are not yet as precious as they will be by January. You begin to need the heating on in the house, and you are unable to sleep with the window open any more because the wind keeps rattling it.

The wind…the wind may be the key. There is something very exhilarating about the first wind in a long time. A day of heavy rain where the trees groan and lose twice the amount of leaves in an hour that they’ve lost in the previous week. Going out into it and feeling it fight you, feeling the life that comes from the freshness of the air. For the first time in many months, wondering just how secure the slates on your roof are…and hearing the wind howl over the top of your chimney.

So maybe that’s it. In summer, the weather tends to feel…dead. Your plants may be thriving and new life sprouting all around, but neither a clear sunny day nor a grey cool day really exhilarates you. The sun may make you feel happy, but it doesn’t fight you (other than in a nasty underhand skin cancer way). Summer offers no resistance. Winter, of course, is all about resistance…is about hiding ourselves away in our burrows and toasting our crumpets until the beautifully frozen lawn thaws once more. But in summer we get lazy, we take the world for granted.

Do we need the autumn to wake us up again?