Light Unseen

And here we are again—falling back into darkness. This is the week of the year I dread the most. I despise walking to my car after work in the dark, miss taking early evening walks with the dogs when there’s still sunlight. I long for the smell of freshly cut grass and those long meandering days of March through October where it feels like the hours—of our days, of our lives—are endless.

To the mockery of my friends and family, I’ve always struggled with knowing whether to fall back or forward—and, conversely, whether to spring forward or back. If you think of it, either can be true. For me, the annual end of Daylight Savings Time makes me want to fall forward into a winter bed and wake up when spring has sprung.

In my opinion, the bears are on to something.

It’s taken me years to dredge up the self-confidence to admit I don’t like fall. I know it’s most people’s favorite season. People go cuckoo for all things pumpkin, for sweaters and boots and football games. I’ve been called a humbug more than once for my autumnal animus. But beyond being a daylight lover, I’m also allergic to all things fall: leaves, dust, mums, cold, dry air, gas heat. Thus, I can look forward to at least one bout of bronchitis and sinus infection each year.

Give me a clear nasal cavity over pumpkin latte any day.

And it’s not just that fall makes me sneeze; it makes me melancholy. I feel older in fall; football games remind me of college days I’ll never get back, friends I’ll never see again. School buses make me remember my childhood and, oh how I’d love to be a child again, if only for a day. In fall I’m reminded that just as the days are shorter, my book of days is abbreviated. The witches and skeletons and fake tombstones adorning the yards make me think of real ghosts and graves.

Lest you doubt the gloominess of fall, just listen to Natalie Cole’s “Autumn Leaves.”

Last Sunday was All Saints Sunday at church: that Sunday when we remember, through bells, candles and narrative, the members of our church who have passed on within the last 12 months. This year, as so many in the past, the names called were not just words spoken in the sanctuary: I could see those loved ones in the pews, could recall conversations, could enumerate the marks they made on my life. I lit candles for my parents, my parents-in-law. I lingered in the melancholy and let myself feel.

Perhaps that’s the value of fall: to force us to tarry long enough in the darkness to experience true emotions— before the whimsical daffodils make us laugh again. Autumn drives us onto our sofas and under quilts, to have time to think, to be. Without lamenting the shortness of the days, would we feel so invigorated when the longer days arrive?

“But fall has Thanksgiving and Christmas,” friends say to me, trying to argue me into becoming a fall lover. And I do adore both of those holidays. But beyond the brightness of those days, there is also a nostalgic acknowledgement of what we’ve lost, who we’ve lost. Thanksgiving and Christmas stand as reminders of how many celebrations have gone before and act as sentries for holidays to come, gatekeepers to a future we can’t predict.

Recently my husband and I watched the Netflix series, “All the Light We Cannot See,” based on the magnificent novel by Anthony Doerr. It’s easily one of the most incredible books I’ve read in recent years, and the screen adaptation was exquisite as well. With its dark ambience, the show was a wise cinematic choice for the first day of standard time, as the cold air whipped leaves around in the dark outside my window.

There is a professor in the story who tells children that the most important light is that which we cannot see. Maybe that is autumn’s significance. Are we so busy sweeping, pushing and tromping through the leaves that we don’t look up to see the brilliant fall trees framed against the azure sky? Too preoccupied with despising the cold and darkness to notice the colorful pageantry taking place?

Do we lament the light we cannot see without understanding there’s a light flickering within us? Waiting for Spring?

That’s what my annual fall disdain is really all about: I need to come to terms with the darkness. To sit alone with the melancholy and the quiet wonderings of my heart. To make something of the time the ground is freezing so that I can spring into action, with renewed hope, refreshed vigor, when Spring comes.

Spring forward.

One of my guilty pleasures is watching “Friends” reruns; they never fail to make me laugh, to lighten my heart. Chandler Bing was always my favorite character, so the recent loss of Matthew Perry hit me hard. How odd to feel genuine grief for someone I have never met. Yet if you’ve read Matthew’s book, you know how many years he spent in darkness. I wanted to see him emerge into the warmth of spring.

That’s what I want for all of us. To find the light, even when it’s unseen.