Does autumn signify change? I don’t know, in my heart it does. Otherwise, why would I feel my heart sinking when I notice the leaves start changing color? It has also started feeling colder in the morning. I don’t mind it though. It helps me wake up early. That and the garbage truck. Why don’t they have some music on? They are waking us up with the noise anyways. Why not add some good morning music to it? It would be hard for people to agree on a playlist. I think Spotify should release a ‘Garbage Truck’ playlist based on what people are listening to at 7 am.
Back to the leaves changing color. Why do the pretty fall colors make me sad? I think because I know they will shed soon. The first fall semester I attended in the USA, I remember just being in awe of the beauty of the colorful trees. I didn’t know how soon the trees shed leaves and become lifeless. The peak fall lasts less than two weeks. By peak fall, I mean most leaves have changed color but they haven’t fallen yet. It is beautiful and US National parks make a big deal of it every year. This means you will be admiring nature from the car in the ticket line traffic for a long time before even entering the park.
I probably feel anxious because it marks the beginning of the long, cold, depressed, and not-so-pretty winters. Do animals feel this way? That is how I think nowadays. I don’t care if organisms in my species feel the same as me. I want to know if the wild animals feel depressed because they see less sun. That validates my feeling. It has to be an animal that still has to earn its bread. Not a house pet. A deer or a lion. A fox? A wild monkey or a chimpanzee. Our closest relative. That can validate that my chimp brain is working normally. That it is okay to feel this way.
What does a monkey do when it feels low? Push through? Do they philosophize it? They don’t take medicine for it. Do they change their diet? Surely they notice it. How else would they know that winter is coming? Turns out there are no wild monkeys in North America. They were here millions of years ago. Then they found some nice tropical forest in the south and never looked back. This is understandable, it is not like they need money or a job for living.
For me, there is no other choice, I have to adapt. I don’t think being jobless in South America is better than feeling a little sad because of the weather in my cozy little apartment in Chicago. Maybe in ten more years, in a bigger house, I won’t even notice it is autumn until October. It will be part of the routine.
Thanks for reading!
