Autumn

Utah is the most awful place on earth. One, It is cold-ish for 6-7 months out of the year, Two,... that's actually the only complaint I have. I love living here in the summer, but any time the temperature drops below fifty-fife degrees I wonder why anyone would voluntarily live here between November and May. But today I experienced an unusual moment when I was actually glad I'm here in the middle of November.

I was walking home from a friend's apartment this afternoon. This friend lives at the Branbury where there are lots and lots of trees. I was walking home with my hands deep in my pockets, hood up, and headphones in with the wind continually trying to push me off the sidewalk and rather than being miserable and angry at the current climate like I am every other cold day, I could only marvel at the brilliant colors of the orange, yellow and red trees with a bright blue sky behind them. I felt like a seven year old as I dragged my shoes through the build up of leaves in the gutters and it was all I could do to not pick up a big pile of leaves and toss them in the air. For those brief fifteen minutes I was 100 percent happy. Not even the sporadic flurries of snow could dampen my mood.

When I got to my own apartment which has 10 trees at the most and at least 60 percent of them are pine trees--which by the way only shed brown pine needles everywhere--my euphoria started to wear off, but I was glad I had a brief escape from from the dull gray existence which we Utahns call winter.