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It's just my annual fall thing

“I looooove fall. It’s my faaaavorite time of year ... all the colors, the cool temps, the blah blah blah.” If words were one-hundreds — $100 bills that is — I could retire off the number of times I’ve heard some version of that before.

I think I’d be close to being able to buy a new pickup truck, just from the number of times I’ve heard it at home from somebody who’s not me.

Don’t get me wrong, if I had my way our seasons would be five months of spring, five months of fall and one month each for summer and winter. It’s my understanding, though, that this isn’t something that I can vote on, nor can I hope that being “the change I want to see” will influence the weather. I have all this on good authority from scientists, those annoying generators of facts and data.

Fall is alright. I like it well enough to date it, I just don’t want to put a ring on it — as the saying goes. The season is too depressing.

Fall is the end of things.

Plants are going dormant, some are flat out dying. Fall colors, in all their glory, are the consolation prize for the death of flowers. It’s the giant flame-out before winter hits and tries to kill us — kill us all — not for pleasure, or pain, not even for money. Like the parable of the scorpion stinging the frog, causing them both to die in the river, winter tries to kill us simply because that’s its nature.

Winter is pretty and all, too, and it can be fun to party with, but that season is hell-bent crazy, and you never know when it’s true nature is going to kick in and it says, “Yep, it’s time to die.” Even being friends with Winter is a dicey prospect.

Plus, I still have lingering PTSD from the return to school. Kids have it great these days with online learning and social distancing. Back in my day, I didn’t have a pandemic to save me from having to spend time with my peers in the hallowed halls of K-through-12 schools. I had to socialize, to flat-out and face-bare, interact with humans. that totally ruined my academic experience.

Maybe if I’d had kids I would’ve learned to find relief in the return of school-days, finding solace in the peace and quiet of a temporarily empty nest. But, childless, I’m stuck in the perpetual loop of dread over the new school year each fall brings. I don’t wanna get up, I don’t wanna get dressed, I don’t wanna go to stupid school. (Insert fake but dramatic sobbing here.)

Some years I’ve grumped my way through fall as a sort of warm up for whining and complaining my way through winter — that’s sort of my instinctual response to the seasons, the default modus operandi if you will.

Some years I’ve used fall as a time to tap into my better self, find an inner peace and resiliency so enabling me to meet winter with a positive attitude and the sense that I might use this dark and cold of winter to become a better person.

Up until the writing of this column I have been trying denial and subconscious self-medication through overeating as my way to deal with the onset of fall weather. But now that I’ve messed up and brought the season to the forefront of my conscious mind, I don’t know what I’m going to do. Maybe I could try to be thankful that the pandemic allows me to work more from home.

Since I’m being honest and introspective, though, I have to admit that I feel like my psyche is going to shoot for more overeating paired with a large dose of irrational anger.

I’ll let you know how it shakes out for me.

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I feel a lot of I-don’t-wanna’s coming on, some hiding under the covers and a few dramatic, fake sobs, maybe a bit of the real stuff, too, at http://www.facebook.com/viewfromthenorth40.com .

 

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