It’s Fall! Maybe? How I determine when it’s “officially” fall.

The following is taken from The Friday Tomfoolery (8.12.23). It got great feedback, so I’ve reposted it here. A current status update is tagged at the end. Enjoy!

The kids around here have been returning to school for the past couple of weeks. Despite not being very agrarian, we’re still on that kind of schedule. The high school around the corner from us started this week and Chia starts college next week. We’re moving him into the dorms this Saturday.

That means my rhythms will change, despite the memory of those rhythms nestled in my body. I will probably continue to use these markers as harbingers of “fall,” as long as I live on the ranch. (not an actual ranch–there aren’t chickens. Ahem, I mean, we’re not a ranch.)

Ami’s markers of fall 🍂🍁🎃

• The high school marching band starts their 0 hour (6:30 am) with practice on the football field. Note: the football field is across the canal from our home, so we get a lovely echo of all that goes on over there. I differentiate the seasons by the sounds of the various practices wafting over.
• The public pool adjacent to the school is drained. It’s an outdoor pool and not heated (come on–we don’t live in a rich area and contrary to popular belief, it’s not warm year-round). The HS swim team uses another school’s indoor facility.
• Sometime in August, Starbucks lets the PSL loose (pumpkin spice latte).
• The cows come “home,” literally. Someone ships some cows down from the North and they live on a small (for cows) patch of land. It’s situated on the corner of a major thoroughfare and a neighborhood street. Their presence is temperature dependent. When it “cools down” they arrive. When it begins to get “warmer” they go back.

That’s when I officially declare it’s “fall.” Don’t get me wrong–it’s not sweater weather, but there’s a change in the air when all of the above take place. The change used to be more distinct in the evenings. Less so because there’s a lot of building going on around here. Unfortunately, that means it stays hot longer. 

We did just finish breaking our 1974 record with 31 days of temperatures above 110 degrees. 🥵 So there’s that.

I’ll take what I can get. It’ll be “fall” before I know it. 

My October update as of last week: still no cows and the pool hasn’t drained. Soon, I’m sure. We still have a handful of triple digit days lingering, but we’re almost there.

Do you live where there’s a traditional fall? How do you mark the seasons where you live?