The combine was winning a race the other day as I realized it was time for an old friend’s return.
An iron veil of rain darkened the horizon – one of those late August storms that have caused some folks to question their prayers for rain during this prolonged drought –and the dust behind the harvester was like golden smoke. The field was tall and while not perfect, at least healthy when I drove past in the morning, but the heating of the day and the crippling humidity made the sky cry uncle and begin pouring desperately needed rain from horizon to horizon, along with a celebratory lightning bolt or two.
The harvester was on the last pass I drove by, and a groaning truck waited breathlessly. This particular field has a tendency to go from rock-hard dry to muddy mess at the mention of rain, and I couldn’t blame the driver for wanting to get out of there before the dirt turned soft.
I realized that I had been so caught up in the miasma of August that I’d almost forgotten about the golden promise waiting around the corner.
I love September as much as I hate August; true, 100-degree temperatures are not uncommon, and it’s the peak of hurricane season. One must memorize the school bus times and routes, and September is when the politicians can really get down and dirty in their quest for November dominance. Those impossibly huge nightmares called tiger mosquitoes don’t seem to hatch until September back in our section of the woods.
But September brings the promise of better things to come.
The nights eventually clear, and the nonstop hum of air conditioners gives way to overjoyed peepers and lonely young coyotes. By late in the month, the humidity goes down and the stars come out without the haze of summer obscuring their cold blinking flashes.
The clearer skies mean the moon seems fuller – indeed, September’s full moon was called the Corn Harvest Moon by the folks who first settled this land. It’s generally the moon closest to the autumnal equinox, which marks the start of falling leaves, temperatures and stress levels.
September is when the kids have more or less settled back in at school; the first few games are out of the way, and the bugs worked out after young men who forgot about football for a few months have crashed into each other a few times. The gladiators of the Friday Night Lights chase dreams down the gridiron while fans cheer or moan. I could not care less for professional or even college sports. I am likely the least-versed male on the planet when it comes to football. Still, I can enjoy almost any high school game and root for either side with equal enthusiasm. Like my beloved baseball, football is at its purest on the local level.
September means the water is still warm enough to swim, but cool enough that the fish are moving again. Down on the big water, it means shoals of blues, Spanish and spots, croakers protesting at the indignity of being caught, and the flash of a lovely trout, with an occasional carpet-sized flounder that the state may or may not allow a lucky angler to keep – but our state’s travesty of fishing laws are a column for another day.
September means the return of my favorite hunting season: doves. Whether I am with a crowd of other hunters defending a field from incoming pink and gray missiles or just enjoying a quiet corner of cut corn to myself, dove hunting is still my preferred sport. I mean no offense to waterfowlers. I miss the gentlemanly pursuit of quail. But many of the best hunting memories I have are from 50-plus seasons of waiting with a single-barrel shotgun to see if the twisting, turning dot on the horizon will come close enough for me to take home to fill the gap in a plate of mushroom gravy and rice.
September is far too soon for persimmons, of course, but there are apples (both carefully nurtured and ugly) and pears, along with a scant few late grapes that somehow survived a summer of bears, birds, squirrels, possums, coons, foxes and deer just so I can find them and help them fulfil their destiny.
September means the last of the squirrel kits are venturing out on their own, prior to making the leap to adulthood by the next full moon. I don’t hunt them anymore, but I still love watching them. Every squirrel colony is a combination soap opera, comedy and action-adventure movie that Hollywood can never match. With acorns, hickories and corn to be had for the gathering, they’ll grow fat and fluffy and cuss me as I dare disturb their world.
September is when I can finally start eating again without feeling dyspeptic and cantankerous, and there are usually plenty of options – family reunions, church homecomings, fundraisers, cookouts and other gatherings all beckon with plates of fried chicken, the last of the summer vegetable garden’s produce, tables groaning under politely competitive homemade desserts, and hogs cooked slowly, all night, hogs that somehow magically lose their ribs before being sprinkled with vinegar and red pepper and devoured by the plateful.
When I was a kid, September meant the tobacco markets, with the redolence of the golden leaf filling the town as fortunes were made and lost, with most farmers just holding on for another year. With the golden leaf came a golden time for local business, too.
Even today the hulking market warehouses still bear the wonderful, rich smell of tobacco lovingly grown and nurtured, carefully cured and sold to the highest bidder, although now most are silent except for the flutter of pigeon wings, screeching of bats and the scurry of rats. Borderbelt, bright leaf or burley, nothing smells of September like tobacco.
September is often a time for other leaves as well, when the first of our hardwoods reluctantly admit that summer is over, and begin dropping their faded summer dress, one leaf at a time. My tulip poplar always sheds its leaves rather dramatically on the first really cool morning, while the oaks, maples and gum are far more discreet in their autumnal deshabille.
Yes, September has plenty of dark memories, times of anger and sadness, of frustration and uncertainty. But those are not as frequent as the pleasant days of the ninth month.
A few hours after I write these words, we will bid goodbye to accursed August. Yes, the weather will still be reminiscent of the worst of summer for a while.
But the golden promise of September is soon to be fulfilled, a cool first kiss of autumn, a time to say goodbye to the heat of summer and hello to the cooling, colorful comfort of a new season, new chances, and new memories waiting to be made, whether on a windswept pier, a riverbank, beside a cut cornfield or in a football stadium on a Friday night.
Welcome, September. Oh, we have missed you.
