Fall Freakout

There's a stretch of road on my drive to work that gives me pause every day. Normally my driving paranoia keeps my eyes plastered on the road, but here I give myself a split second to take in the panorama. What's so special about this particular piece of highway? It's the view. 360° of clear views over rolling fields and forest.

A month ago when I was still making the rounds and meeting everyone for the first time, my little piece of small talk was about how excited I was to see fall for the first time in three years. "How do you like the area?" "It's beautiful. I can't wait to see what fall looks like around here." That was a popular exchange. That was followed by, "How do you like living in the middle of all the trees?" "Oh, it's so pretty. I can't wait for the fall!" Yeah, I talked a big talk.

Labor Day weekend, I was driving with my brother on the way to pick up a friend for a golf outing. My eyes widened in horror as I noticed something out of the ordinary- the leaves weren't green, and a few of them HAD FALLEN TO THE GROUND! Then, when I got back to my apartment I noticed that the tree in my neighbor's yard had a touch of the yellow disease as well.

The trees weren't the only thing that seemed to be withering before my eyes. The beautiful, purple-mauve Joe Pye weeds that were growing along the side of the road were fading to brown and being replaced by goldenrod. In fact, all of the meadows were losing all colors but goldenrod. The few fields of corn that exist in Vinton County were changing colors the same way that my aunt and uncle's fields were- the tops were still vibrant, but they were scary shades of brown on the bottom.

I had my fall freak out that day. All of the sudden I no longer wanted to see the leaves change. I no longer wanted summer to end because that meant that winter was not far off, and I'm still not sure how I'm going to handle that season change. I have a little book of "Pearls Before Swine" that features the crocodiles. In one strip, the rat has convinced the crocs that tomato seeds are actually zebra seeds and if they pick the tomatoes before they're ready, the crocs would be killing the zebras. The last strip shows one of the crocs giving mouth-to-mouth to a tomato shouting, "STAY AWAY FROM THE LIGHT!" I felt like that croc. I didn't want the trees to die, I wanted to run around and stick the leaves back on the tree. I wanted to water the flowers and make them pretty purple colors again. I was out of control.

Thankfully, my fall freak out only lasted a few days and now I'm back to enjoying everything I like about fall. The days are just warm enough to enjoy sans jacket, the skies are clear blue almost every day, and the trees are turning the gorgeous shades of red, orange, and yellow that I missed for three years. And that panoramic view? I can't wait until it's peak color season. Fall freak out over, I can now turn my attention to the next problem: cold weather. Ladies and gents, I was spoiled by South Carolina, and I'm going to miss my 70° Decembers.