Fall.

Fall palette., originally uploaded by Luna Soledad.

Fall. I can almost taste it. So close, yet so far away... and these 70 degree teasers just before the temperature shoots back up into the '90's are driving me nuts! But I'll take what I can get. At least my glasses no longer fog up from the hellish humidity when I walk out of the house in the mornings.

I love Fall. It's my most favorite time of year. In part thanks to the cool splendor and beautiful Fall palette that slips quietly into our surroundings as summer succumbs to its miserable death and the reign of the mosquito comes to an end... but for me, Fall also makes me giddy with nostalgia for my most treasured memories...

Four-wheeling on country back roads and fields in my old Jeep with the doors off, cruising in my friend Karen's gold LeBaron convertible mooing at cows, sitting in the parking lot of Cup-A-Joe's at 2 am reading poetry, riding motorcycles in the rain, camping at my Grandma's pond with friends and singing songs around a fire, school night visits to NC State and driving back the next day for class wearing the same clothes from the day before, impromptu parties at Sammy's and him coming home in the middle of the night using a flashlight to make his way through the minefield of bodies sleeping on his living room floor, and the oh-so-many adventures at ECU... Oh those were the days!

I remember hanging out at Fort Bragg with my dear friend Trawick and some other army buddies one Friday night bored. We decided on a whim to take off and go somewhere... We ended up camping at Lake Lure in a freshly cleared logging area on a mountain top and sleeping beneath the stars. We sat up all night talking, drinking, and laughing while Maloney ran up and down the steep hill on all fours howling at the full moon and Rosenburger ate cold beans out of a can. --The next day we made our way across a rushing mountain stream and went repelling down a cliff.

One night, my friend George and I followed a big water pipe beneath the town of Smithfield for what seemed like forever until our backs ached to the point we could go no further... Why you ask? No particular reason aside from the fact that we could and it seemed like a good idea at the time.

And Halloween... Long before there was the tedious task of walking around with small children begging for candy from our neighbors, All-Hallows-Eve was a night filled with mischief, costumes, and scaring the crap out of one another.

Oh the memories, and so many I dare not share here.

And then comes Thanksgiving, my most favorite holiday of all and of course that has nothing at all to do with the smorgasbord of delectable food -- honest. ;-)

Yay for Fall!

"Autumn wins you best by this its mute appeal to sympathy for its decay."

...Robert Browning