It is crisp. I love that word and everything it means in the context of autumn. The weather is crisp and requires a jacket, the tip of your nose seems to grow pink in the air, your cheeks a bit rosier. The leaves crunch beneath your feet and the fall of harvest fruits and vegetables mean the winter is coming in (but its not quite here yet).
It is colorful. The last of the flowering blooms come out to play before curling up for their winter slumber. The aspen trees in the Colorado mountains turn the hillsides gold and red and orange...a continual season of sunset.
The pumpkins...the hayrides...the cozy feeling of curling up under a blanket...
Oh, I miss that.
The seasons are changing here in Ghana, but its different. August is cool and gentle and quiet. The air is cooler, more refreshing somehow. But we are moving from rainy season into Hamatan (the dry season). The skies build up with moisture (commonly referred to as "humidity") until you feel like you reside in a perpetual swimming pool of sweat and then...the blessed rains come, a sigh of relief from the sky. And it cools down, for just a moment.
And the comes the dust...when the rains go away, the dust from the Sahara fills our skies and for the next four months, it looks like fog rolling over the hills just beyond us. The ground dries and and great chasms form in the roads. And the same is true of our skin. Even in the humidity, our skin reacts to the new dry air and heels begin to crack.
At the end of the day, the only thing you can do to relieve yourself in the slightest is to take a nice cold shower before hitting the hay.
And that is where I am. Debating the cold shower. My bathroom light blew out this morning and I forgot to change the bulb. "Shower in the dark?" I wonder, "or brave the heat of the night."
Going for a dark shower.
What I wouldn't give for a cozy moment right now, with a good book, the crisp air, the falling leaves, the beauty of all that the changing of seasons implies.
I wish I could pack the crisp air, colorful leaves, and all that fall brings in the bins we're bringing to you! At least you'll have some good coffee and chocolate and probably a book or two to enjoy. :)
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