Thursday, October 6, 2011

On US of (f)A(ll)

Actually, that title should have been "US of A(utumn)", but then it just looked wrong using the British term when writing about the US. (U.S., if I'm being consistent in my AmericanEnglishness. Which I'm not. Of course.)

Autumn/fall (okay, since I'm on the topic. "Fall" is a silly word. It means something else, people. Having it both as the name of a season and "to drop or come down freely under the influence of gravity" makes things unnecessary confusing. "That was a great fall!"). Autumn/fall is for me the season most closely tied with the United States. Partly, it's because when I was there, I experienced fall (of the seasonal and not gravital kind). I saw beautiful foliage in several parts of the country, I tasted fall specialties such as pumpkin pie or candy corn, and I witnessed stores decorate for the most American of holidays: Halloween and Thanksgiving. Even before I visited the US, however, it was firmly established that fall is the "national" season.

Halloween and Thanksgiving helps. So does pictures from the North-East, of tall, gorgeous trees competing for personal bests in the "show your colour"-competition. The idea of fairs and festivals, pies, harvest, gigantic fields - again very much a part of my idea of the US before I went there.

All these things considered, I don't think it's surprising that it is during this time of year I mostly want to go back. I want to celebrate Halloween, the American way (would you BELIEVE that I left the country the day before Halloween?!). I want to hang out with a stereotypical sit-com family that watch football on TV while mom cooks the turkey for Thanksgiving. I want to have more pumpkin pie (even though I didn't like it much). I want to walk along a Minnesota field while admiring the colourful forest ahead. I want to smell stuff like maple and cinnamon and other things comprised into "pumpkin spice" in a Starbucks latte.








7 comments:

Trisha said...

We in Australia call it autumn too ;) Fall makes sense if you're in a country where most of the leaves fall in ...well, Fall. But here in Aus we don't seem to get much of that. hehe

Kelly said...

We don't always have quite the vareity in the seasons down here in my part of the US. That doesn't stop me from gearing up for the holidays, though!

Maybe I'll e-mail you a virtual pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving. :) Meanwhile I have flashing skeleton lights hanging in the window behind me. They're for my own benefit since I get no trick-or-treaters out here where I live. :)

CA Heaven said...

Fall was great when we lived in Colorado, with the yellow aspens >:)

Cold As Heaven

Hart Johnson said...

Awww... You can come to my house any time you want--fall is a great time for it. I guess I should appreciate it more. At the moment I am pouting about the 'summer over' thing, but there are some pretty good things to enjoy.

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Cruella, feel free to join us for football and turkey this year!

Emily said...

Hello! Found you via NaBloWriMo, and I enjoy your blog very much!

I must agree with you about "fall" and "autumn," though I am from the US- partly because autumn is a much prettier word!

Pat Tillett said...

We call if Autumn also, but since palm trees don't change color, I'm not sure why... Oh yeah, the days get shorter as well...

Related Posts with Thumbnails