The Richness of Autumn

The air here in Annapolis has cooled. Starting out in morning, the thermometer registers low sixties and rises only to mid-seventies later in the day. Our famous humidity has vanished. The oaks and sycamores have not yet begun to turn crimson and gold, but it is, without a doubt, autumn. The equinox of the season was yesterday, September 22nd. 

Fall is my favorite time of the year–surpassing even spring with its spectacular cherry trees flooding lawns and streets with wide drifts of pink and white. However, it is not only the crisp weather that comes as a shock to the skin after temperatures in the upper nineties fade out. 

No, it is the turning of the season that does it for me–the knowledge that there is the chance to start over in ways that do not strike me as possible in winter, when my garden lies barren, despite the arrival of January 1st. Now there is the September Equinox itself, which appeals to the more mystical side of me: the full moon, Halloween, and pagan ritual feasts. 

Most special to me, the arrival of autumn in September brings the Jewish New Year’s observance of Rosh Hashanah–called “The Days of Awe” to those in the know–which was celebrated in 2020 on the Friday night just past us. At sundown on this upcoming Monday, Yom Kippur, (also known as “The Day of Atonement”), will close the holiday cycle as the sun sinks in the west, with the breaking of a full day’s fast and many hours spent in temple. I always think back to my mother, as well, as she died in the fall of 1974; I remember our love during the Yizkor service, one created to honor those who have passed since the last Holy Day. 

Yom Kippur is replete with repentance, as we meditate on our transgressions from the preceding twelve months, followed by the majesty of forgiveness from both God and all those around us; we hope to be deemed worthy and have our names sealed in “The Book of Life” for the following year. 

Today, I no longer observe Rosh Hashanah’s sweet “Head of the Year” traditions. Still, as I write to you now, I well remember how I used to braid challah in circular loaves fragrant with honey and studded with raisins, how I braised a savory pot roast–otherwise known as brisket–and then baked an apple cake with an icing of brown sugar.

 It has been years since I followed these customs, or those of Yom Kippur, and so a certain kind of melancholy lingers inside me. Nevertheless, I also feel the pleasure of it all in my bones: those years of spending these particular times with my sons and husband and friends have created indelible recollections for which I am grateful.

 Now, every autumn leads me to summon up pictures from the past that are beloved: each face as we gathered around the table I had set with my best china for Rosh Hashanah; a few hours later, all of us in temple, following along with the rabbi as we ran our fingers across the Hebrew script in our prayer books, trying to catch even a few phrases of the text; my mother’s kind smile. In all these ways, the richness of autumn is inscribed in the book of my memories. 

Here is a poem, written by Mary Oliver, my favorite, that captures the emotions I feel about this season of our year: 

 Fall Song 

Another year gone, leaving everywhere
its rich spiced residues: vines, leaves,

the uneaten fruits crumbling damply
in the shadows, unmattering back

from the particular island
of this summer, this NOW, that now is nowhere

except underfoot, moldering
in that black subterranean castle

of unobservable mysteries – roots and sealed seeds
and the wanderings of water. This

I try to remember when time’s measure
painfully chafes, for instance when autumn

Yours,