The Light Is Leaving And Its Hard To Breathe, Buried In The Pile Of Leaves

September ends with midnight, calendar autumn is wrapping up its first week, and still the temperatures grind along in the 90s here in rural west Tennessee, despite the abundance of falling leaves and the earlier encroaching of darkness, despite the hopes of open windows and bittersweet chills among most everybody in and around Memphis. The cats laze in the yard as always, sides heaving in the almost physically-tangible humidity, apathetically watching bugs they’re too lazy to hunt trundle past their grasp. Out on the highways, drivers swelter in older cars without adequate air conditioning, such as my 1980 Firebird, listening with dismay to the forecasted temperatures. Wild speculation abounds regarding whether climate change will mean a milder, or much harsher, winter this year. Our heat’s still not repaired, so I’m pulling for the former. As for me, I’m gathering inner reserves of strength and renewed confidence not just for the spooky gray season, my favorite all-too-fleeting time of the year, but also for a short tour in late October and early November, up to New York and back, with the usual attendant gas station sandwiches and sleeping on sticky floors sure to come. I hope all goes smoothly.

Meanwhile, my stomach aches as if I’ve been gutshot – an ulcer, my first in a decade and significantly more painful than the previous. It comes in strange waves – either I’m feeling mostly normal or I’m on the floor writhing in agony, moaning, unable to process the dull, jagged ache. The cats circle me, concerned and meowing, but I’m trying to maintain focus through the inconvenience, putting finishing touches on a number of projects, steeling myself to begin others. Life continues on relentlessly, regardless of personal pain or triumph. Leaves fall no matter who is there to watch them or comment on their colors. The world will darken and cool, a new year will blossom, and hopefully soon we’ll see this country begin to tidy up the wreckage of the recent wearying years of idiocy and tyranny. I’ll keep my fingers crossed for now, beneath this punishing summer sun, my head filled with cardboard bats and candy pumpkins.