Dog Days
September in central Texas - it's not quite summer but it sure isn't autumn.
[caption id="attachment_1195" align="aligncenter" width="1748"]
Bigtooth Maple, Lost Maples State Park[/caption]
Dove season has kicked off, kids are back in school, and football has been reinstated as the official Texas religion. Big box stores have Christmas decorations on the shelves already. Pumpkin spice in everything possible (an unholy thing). As I write this the opening day of archery season for deer is about a week away. The calendar proclaims today is the first day of fall. But with our afternoon temperatures still flirting with the century mark, doing anything outdoors is an invitation for heat stroke.
Summer trips to the mountains to chase trout in cold streams are over. No appreciable rainfall locally in the last eight weeks in central Texas leaves local creeks and rivers unappealing. Blue green algae and brain-eating amoebas lurk, and even if they weren't the sun seems intent to bake my brain into terra cotta. I am just whittling the days away, counting time until it actually feels like fall. Welcome to the Texas version of cabin fever.
But there are subtle reminders that relief is coming. The loss of a few minutes of daylight each day, and the barely perceptible taste of autumn on the evening breeze. In northern climes we are beginning to hear of snow and the autumn ladies of aspen donning their gowns of yellow in the San Juans. Soon those locales will see ski season beginning, but this far south we must be patient, and thank the creator of air conditioning.
Here in the Austin area women will soon be wearing sweaters, creatively tied scarves and Uggs (are those still a thing?), even if the mercury crowds 90. I will likely still sport shorts and Chacos into November. Tomato, to mah toe.
So dog days they may be, but like all days they are numbered. As Ecclesiastes reminds us (with accompaniment from the Byrds)...
[caption id="attachment_1195" align="aligncenter" width="1748"]
Bigtooth Maple, Lost Maples State Park[/caption]Dove season has kicked off, kids are back in school, and football has been reinstated as the official Texas religion. Big box stores have Christmas decorations on the shelves already. Pumpkin spice in everything possible (an unholy thing). As I write this the opening day of archery season for deer is about a week away. The calendar proclaims today is the first day of fall. But with our afternoon temperatures still flirting with the century mark, doing anything outdoors is an invitation for heat stroke.
Summer trips to the mountains to chase trout in cold streams are over. No appreciable rainfall locally in the last eight weeks in central Texas leaves local creeks and rivers unappealing. Blue green algae and brain-eating amoebas lurk, and even if they weren't the sun seems intent to bake my brain into terra cotta. I am just whittling the days away, counting time until it actually feels like fall. Welcome to the Texas version of cabin fever.
But there are subtle reminders that relief is coming. The loss of a few minutes of daylight each day, and the barely perceptible taste of autumn on the evening breeze. In northern climes we are beginning to hear of snow and the autumn ladies of aspen donning their gowns of yellow in the San Juans. Soon those locales will see ski season beginning, but this far south we must be patient, and thank the creator of air conditioning.
Here in the Austin area women will soon be wearing sweaters, creatively tied scarves and Uggs (are those still a thing?), even if the mercury crowds 90. I will likely still sport shorts and Chacos into November. Tomato, to mah toe.
So dog days they may be, but like all days they are numbered. As Ecclesiastes reminds us (with accompaniment from the Byrds)...
To everything (turn, turn, turn)
There is a season (turn, turn, turn)
And a time to every purpose, under heaven
There is a season (turn, turn, turn)
And a time to every purpose, under heaven
Comments