Blog Journal #5

Autumn

Loss, grief and autumn leaves

27^th October 2020

This year has really tested all of us, but on a personal level this has been one of the most difficult of years, stepping away from a job, then the lockdown happened, going through months of therapy all this hit hard. But recently we suffered a loss in the family which has deeply affected everyone. Anyone who knew or met Andy will testify to what a wonderful man with a huge heart he really was. A light has gone out in our life. A huge character that would fill a room with laughter. All is now silent.

Autumn is one of my most favourite times of the year, watching the leaves turn from their late summer greens into those warm autumn reds, russets and golds has been special this year. Maybe it is because we have taken the time to stop and look at the colours.

Is it my imagination or have the colours this autumn been more spectacular than recent years? Walking through a wood and watching the falling leaves makes you realise how the seasons move so quickly when you wish just for a fleeting moment that time would standstill just for a while longer to appreciate the spectacle. As autumn progresses and the winds increase soon the trees will be stripped bare of all their leaves, but those fallen leaves can have a real purpose in giving a home to wildlife through the winter. Those quiet and still autumn days with not a breath of wind are the best, when you see wood smoke rising straight and true. These are the days I love the most.

With Halloween just days away we have our own spooky reads that we recall but two of my favourite ‘creepy’ novels are Dracula by Bram Stoker and Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. Classics in their own right. There are Pumpkins on sale so it must be time to make Spicy Pumpkin soup and snacking on roasted pumpkin seeds.

A poem for autumn:

Autumn Fires, by Robert Louis Stevenson

In the other gardens

And all up the vale,

From the autumn bonfires

See the smoke trail!

Pleasant summer over

And all the summer flowers,

The red fire blazes,

The grey smoke towers.

Sing a song of seasons!

Something bright in all!

Flowers in the summer,

Fires in the fall!”

The clocks have now gone back and the days are getting shorter and there is the sound of the first fireworks going off as soon as darkness falls. We spend more time indoors and there is nothing better than curling up with a good book as you listen to the wind howling and the rain against the window. Autumn is a time when publishers release the big books in time for the pre-Christmas push for sales and never before has your local bookshop needed all our support. Please if you can, do pop in or visit them online. Believe me there are some fantastic books out now just waiting to be snapped up.

Which reminds me, I have not run a book prize draw for some months and so I will be running a draw in the very near future and maybe there could be an added treat with the book.

 We are still living through some very difficult and worrying times and none of us know what the months ahead will bring, but we will help each other through these troubled times but until next time, Keep Safe and happy reading.

John Fish

The Last Word Book Review