September 2022 - Homecoming

Well, I'm back.  These golden woods are home, and it is good to be among them once again.  I wonder if sometimes the greatest adventure is the return from a journey, the homecoming.  And what a perfect season to return to!  The world is aglow with golden browns and oranges and greens, the familiar carpet of bermuda grass and clover is soft underfoot on these dwindling Indian summer days, and crisp with frost in these chilly autumn mornings. 

Every traveler has a home of his own, and he learns to appreciate it the more from his wandering.

- Charles Dickens

There is tremendous satisfaction in slowly planting each footstep in a familiar hollow.  I hear the grasses swish, the dried wild mint rattle and hiss, the brown and gold and auburn leaves crunch with every step.  There's the friendly chatter of crickets, a steady trilling hum that I have missed, and the spurts of familiar bird song - cardinals, house wrens, the hollow drilling of a woodpecker. I can smell wood smoke from my thoughtful spot today, and slowly composting leaves, and the warm scent of sunshine on damp moss.  The maple by the back door is splendid gold, and its ivy covered trunk, the darkest of indigo greens, makes the most beautiful contrast. I love this mingling of the transient and the evergreen.  It's a bit like home and me - the one

constant and ever-present, the other touched by changing seasons, relishing the life-giving constancy for a while, then flying from the branches.  Someday I, too, hope to root myself into the bark of some old tree and trade my golden deciduous adventures for the evergreeness of home.

It's September, and the orchards
are afire with red and gold,
And the nights with dew are heavy, and the morning's sharp with cold;
Now the garden's at its gayest
with the salvia blazing red
And the good old-fashioned asters laughing at us from their bed;
Once again in shoes and stockings are the children's little feet,
And the dog now does his snoozing on the bright side of the street.

- Edgar Guest, It's September

I've rediscovered this year how exciting wild harvesting can be.  The persimmons are ripe and falling from the tree by the basketfull, sweeter now after a few frosts.  It's an incredible thing to gather these odd and uninspiring little fruits from the ground, and know that they will add their peculiar spice and citrus flavor and host of healthful benefits to a multitude of breads and pies and scones.  A smattering of very early frost flowers have appeared over the last few mornings, the surest herald of winter.

“Hope” is the thing with feathers - / That perches in the soul -
And sings the tune without the words - / And never stops - at all -

 - Emily Dickinson

But best of all, this homely Thoughtful Spot is filled with chatter, laughter, and the family who, far more than my beloved woods, make this little corner of Middle Tennessee my home.  And though I know they have heard over and again all my stories of how exciting and different these wandering thoughtful spots have been over the past months, they listen to me generously. I marvel at how far away and wonderful those places now seem, and at how real and vibrant is this present moment.

I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I'll go to it laughing.

- Herman Melville, Moby Dick

It's a dangerous business, going out one's door, you never know where you might be swept off to... this year I've been swept off to many a thoughtful spot, and seen many a wonder, and walked Providential paths that I wouldn't trade for anything.  But on this sunny day of a fleeting September I know for sure that it's this thoughtful spot at home, and those who share it with me, that will always hold my heart.