There is just something about that brilliant colored fall foliage that is so calming and beautiful. It gets me every year, every season, anew.
As I walk or drive though the streets and the parks, the beauty of melding reds, golds, crimsons, orange and pinks is simply stunning.
As September, October and November roll in, and the ombre sunset colors streak across the vistas, I soak in the magic of it all.
Every hue of red, green, orange and yellow is there, in brilliant burning color.
The bridges, the terraces, the ponds, and even more ordinary scenery, when framed against the melange of fall’s trees and vines, takes on an ethereal golden dusk quality, be it ten in the morning or two in the afternoon.
It’s as if you are living through that elusive prelude to sunset’s “Golden Hour” for the duration of the entire day.
Here in New York City, seeing the famous skyline framed by the fiery kaleidoscopic colors of a streaky sunset, in the form of fiery trees, is breathtaking — the mix Mother Nature and modern architecture.
This quality of everywhere you walk feeling like you are a part of a beautiful painting is nature’s gift.
I keep hearing how dull fall foliage is here, due to drought. Yet, everywhere I turn, it’s the opposite, fall foliage in its splendor.
As the chlorophyll in the leaves leave, it’s absence makes room for other colors to seep through, hence the differing colors that shine through the leaves.
As spring emerges, it happens slowly and gradually, each day bringing more and more color, blossom and growth. After a few weeks, though, the beautiful emerald grass and floral scenery are pretty much set for the season.
The beauty of fall foliage is that it is ever-changing, never static. It is as if G-d were standing by a switch on a celestial lamp, constantly adjusting it for mood lighting. The blazing colors fluctuate from day to day, sometime even within one day, to more muted tones. There is that amber quality of light that autumn brings, bathing us all in a golden halo of warm tones and light.
Be it in the mountains, the countryside or the city, landscape that was once an emerald green is transformed into pumpkin oranges, deep yellows and reds. The pure blue skies that play as background only highlight the vividness of it all even more.
Soon, it will all slip away, making way for winter.
As a teen, I remember once sharing with someone my love of fall; of the crunching carpets of leaves and the glorious Maple and Aspen tree colors shifting all around, as the scenery of the day beckoned. Her response was: How sad it makes me! Seeing the leaves falling, the trees becoming bare.
Nature dying all around. Winter coming.
While I am no longer in touch with this person, each fall season I think of what she said. While it may be true, it is not how I experience this season. For me, the sheer beauty eclipses those somber thoughts. I embrace the season’s gifts and think of the next season’s gifts to come.
Life — a journey of seasons. Not all cleanly delineated like nature’s division into four segments. Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer.
They might complement the different seasons of our life from youth to old age, but more often our respective seasons differ, depending on so many factors.
Across the expanses of time each of us finds some seasons more productive than others, harder to endure than others, more joyful than others. Like nature’s seasons, they come and go, they slip, morph and unfold, with the rhythms of our lives.
As the gorgeous fall colors and trees take a hold of me each autumn, they seem to whisper this to me, each year anew.
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