Autumn Leaves, Central Valley. © Copyright 2021 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.
Autumn leaves litter the ground at a remote location in California’s Central Valley.
Every August I begin to anticipate autumn. Yes, I know. It isn’t August until tomorrow. But bear with me. Summer is nice, but it is not my favorite season. I’ll concede that it is the time of home grown tomatoes, warm evenings, easy outdoor time, and more. But when it comes to my favorite season, it is more or less a toss-up between autumn and winter — and if pressed I think I would have to come down on the side of autumn. Even here in California, autumn brings the promise (and eventually the reality) of cooler temperatures, along with more interesting and varied weather and a color change that rivals that of spring.
This photograph comes from very late fall last year, on an early December morning when I was out in California’s Great Central Valley to photograph a rather different subject. I had arrived before dawn. It was cold and there was frost here and there. After photographing through sunrise I paused for breakfast and a cup of coffee… and looked down to see this little patch of autumn.
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.
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Yes!
Especially when it comes to winter and summer, the cross-quarter days feel more connected to the seasonal transitions to me.
Dan
I celebrate the cross-quarter day’s every year! Love the changing season! The Old Farmers Almanac has good information on that subject. Nowadays we really miss out on seasonal changes because most folks are not familiar with agricultural (or even temperature discomfort) that is tied to the ‘pilgrimage of the sun’ (as Henry Beston so eloquently described in ‘The Outermost House’) .
I agree and I was even able to find some evidence that August is the beginning of autumn especially in ancient/Irish calendars!
Recently I read that another geological name for leaf litter is ‘duff’. I like that, kind of a cute name for a pet!
Happy Autumn/Lammastide!
William Shakespeare, Romeo & Juliet: ‘On Lammas-Eve at night shall she be fourteen;…’
There’s actually (sort of) scientific support for the idea that the seasons begin at times other than those we use to mark them.
I heard years ago about something called “cross-quarter days.” These are the points in the middle of our familiar seasons, and some have proposed that they should mark the changing of the seasons. For example, the cross quarter days marking the start and end of this alternative summer would be equidistant from the solstice — e.g. about six weeks before and after our familiar late-June date. The first and last days of summer would have the same amount of daylight.
By that method, summer would end during the first week of… August!
Dan