I love living in a climate with such

dramatic changes in temperature and season. I’m a mover, a shaker, a person who has difficulty sitting still for long periods of time. I’ll like to change things up. Ask my husband. I’m forever whining about altering the layouts of various rooms throughout the house because I love that feeling of walking into a newly painted or rearranged room and saying “Oh! It looks so different!” We all get off somewhere right? And I think it’s totally hot to move the bookshelf three inches to the left.

The month of August has always rendered me poetic. It’s a time when the hazy afternoon hours seem to drag by, the sun unrelenting. The sun moves closer to the south as it sets, and if you breathe in the warm air deeply enough you can smell the sweetness of autumn lying just below the surface, waiting as the minutes of dwindling sunlight tick by, getting closer with every sunset.

Autumn never comes as surprise; we always know she’ll arrive on time. And still we’re never quite ready to remember why the goldenrod flowers bloom so brightly and why the pollen sends small fists to itchy eyes. Yet we always act so startled to see summer’s last hurrah.

We’re never quite ready to release June and July for another year, as if holding on to them will somehow keep the chill of a Northern Maine winter from the backs of our necks and the cracks in our window sills. Or maybe if we close our eyes tightly enough and remember how the lazy river snakes its way across the County or how the fat bumblebees wobble from one blossom to another, winter won’t bring us to our knees this year.

It’s part of the dance. We say we’re not ready for summer to end but we revel in the blooming sunflowers and hold the plumping apples in our hands as they pass the time until the first frost sweetens them for pie. We dig our hands into our vegetable gardens, waiting to harvest our summer efforts. We anticipate nature’s painted landscapes of fiery orange and brilliant reds, knowing how sweet the air will taste as we hike over the crunching leaves in September.

It’s the goldenrods. Despite the warmth outside my window they never fail to put me in an autumn state of mind.