The Autumn of Our Content
The temperatures are dipping below the sixties; “The Great Pumpkin Waltz” is upon lips and repressed whistles of Christmas carols are not far behind. The warm smell of long-unused car heating ducts is replacing the strangely antiseptic smell of air conditioning. It is finally fall. Humanity may be plunging into its own private chaoses, but the natural world is humming right along.
Autumn is nature’s way of asking the rest of itself to calm down, and naturally, being a sedate person I relish the invitation. I am not inclined towards effort and it is pleasant to have a season that mirrors the desire take stock and restock. It is not that I am making light of things up here — it is just that you really get a sense of the quiet optimism in Ecclesiastes, when wise old Solomon declares everything meaningless; perhaps he had a corn maze to return to.
The arrival of pumpkins at market, in particular, is one thing I feel should receive 24/7 coverage in lieu of current stories. Pumpkins are delightfully absurd things: delightful mixture of vegetable corpulence, bright orange and dark, healthy green stems is the sort of thing in nature a child would create. Looking upon one, you are incapable of remembering there are such pandemics as a coronavirus or a presidential election. And this is needful medicine.
Placing undue importance upon pumpkins highlights other things we’ve made too big a deal out of, namely politics. I have come to the conclusion that, at least in the current age, it is impossible for two different political opinions to exist in a human relationship in which either party believes politics are a foundational matter. Either you will both agree on politics so that you can discuss them, or agree politics are unimportant so you can avoid discussing them. Once upon a time, perhaps, you might have agreed to disagree, but even then I think the real secret was the ancient wisdom that politics did not matter so much as other things.
To me, this week at least, the other things are grounded in the cool temperatures of fall; the cold, earthy wet turf of a cheap golf course dug up by a thousand attacks by a five-iron; the rattle of a Red Flyer across a state route to the Amish store, tugged by a mother of four (or at least, the four present). We have been so occupied with giving grief that we have forgotten that it is soon time to give thanks, the bigger of the two events in November. Somehow, a country that could notice and treasure these things would survive the outcome of an election even if Sarah Palin were elected.
The texts are piling up on the phone. The news story that broke this evening will make any advice to set aside politics seem insensitive, and perhaps it is. But I cannot help stepping outside and admiring the stars made crisp by frost-whispering breezes before I return to the headlines.
