The bright shades of Autumn awake me from the revelry of driving slumber. Take me out of the car, off the road and into a memory with the taste of sugar on baked grapefruit.
It’s cold. Much colder than it is now. Today is unseasonably warm but here we are wearing scalves and watching our breath dissipate into nothingness like dreams carried on silent words. Our bodies are wrapped up against the elements but our heads, our faces, our minds, remain exposed so that we don’t miss a thing. As with all such memories, this one seems naive. As if we didn’t know what we were doing and had no idea what was to come. But that’s what I like about it. That’s what I like about most memories.
Funny how leaves can trigger such mental events. Rising in darkness, an hour of team sport, conversation with a family member, my favourite TV show, all pass into the meniality of daily life whilst the orange-brown hue of trees preparing to hiberate provides a stimulation that shapes the remainder of my day. Puts me in a mood. Not a bad mood per se, but into some state of mind where previously I ran on autopilot.
I’m hungry but eating feels so mundane. I don’t have the concentration to read and I drop my guitar back onto it’s rack when it fails to stir in me the passion of the guy behind my speakers. Yup, those leaves have got me thinking. Was that a good time? Do I miss it? I certainly miss some of it.
But it’s more serenity than melancholy. It’s not that my brain isn’t working properly, quite the opposite, it’s in overdrive and doesn’t want to waste time on the trivial. It wants to act, to create. I may not have the attention span for many things but, apparently, I have the focus for writing. For writing this. And for that, I am thankful for this mood.
