by Annette LaSelle
This morning, as I one more time pulled on my tank top and shorts to go walking, I couldn’t stop sighing while I petted my brand-new-fresh-out–of-the-box hoodie. It is autumn. I know that because people all around me are carving pumpkins, and leaves are piling up hither and yon, and we are narrowing in on our return to real time instead of the government’s manufactured one. Those are my only guideposts. You see, here in the land of two seasons, summer and the other one, we are setting another record today. Ninety-two degrees Fahrenheit! That is so unfair! In Bemidji , Minnesota , as it should be, it is snowing today! I am so jealous. They don’t have to put on the same clothes they’ve been wearing for the last 220 days to go walking. In fact, since it is snowing, they can toss off that walk without a speck of guilt!
I read somewhere (I know exactly where – in Sylvia Browne’s book) that heaven is always 75 degrees and sunny. If that is true I’m not going there. I choose Bemidji , Minnesota , instead, where they have four sincere seasons. Just as you are beginning to really weary of one, it’s gone and a whole new season is at hand. Seasons keep you contented and, if you use them, as you should, they keep you fit too.
Because you know with four sincere seasons that summer is going to last its allotted three months you hurl yourself into it! You swim, kayak, garden, barbeque, bike ride, hit tennis balls, golf and just generally tucker yourself out. You are so sick of summer at the end of those three months that you are positively ebullient when you see the first red leaf of autumn. Smashing into autumn’s offerings – football, a pile or two of raked up leaves to jump into as you shout “Geronimo”, Halloween, Thanksgiving and then bam –gone. Winter and its play list – sledding, skating, snowboarding, skiing, and just when you can’t see one more gray sky or you’ll turn into Freddy, spring offers you a tulip and you are once again of pleasing personality. And you have had the experiences you were supposed to have in each season.
Here in the land of summer and the other season, our rulebooks for appropriate activities during a particular equinox or solstice become smudged and almost illegible. No need to hurry up and do summer things while you can, because you can positively dawdle and still have time left over to do summer things. And you need not worry about partaking of those wonderful winter offerings. They just plain are not available. If you are feeling woebegone about that, you can, of course, journey by car or air with five million other winter-fun-seekers to a destination that comfortably provides for twelve.
The rest of the story… I am from a burg very close to Bemidji , Minnesota . I spent all of my growing up years and then some right there in the land of the sincere seasons. And I got out of Dodge the first opportunity that was presented to me. For all of those magical things about seasons, I bet you didn’t know that it takes a body twenty minutes longer to get out the door from October through April in season country. You have to prepare yourself for the elements. That begins by oiling your body so the chapped parts don’t fall off. I always found 10/30 weight most effective. Next you layer your clothing. Don’t stop until you look like you are wearing a fat suit. Forget the trendy, fashionable heeled leather boots, you’ll only slip and fall and break your neck in those. Get yourself a nice, slick pair of overshoes. A plaid billed hat with earflaps is an absolute must. Do not be intimidated. Everyone around you will be sporting the same get-up although the plaids in the hats may vary a skosh.
Maybe they’ll show pictures of it snowing in Bemidji on the Internet or the TV. If so, I’ll spend the day fanning myself in the record temperatures, while watching the gentle white flakes descend from the heavens in places that have not been gypped of three of God’s four seasons. Sigh.
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