First Day of Fall at Last

Those who know me best are very well aware of my love of Fall. It's been my favorite season since I was a kid and I don't know why. I remember the weekends with crisp leaves, fireplaces and Redskins game comin' over the rabbit ears onto the color 13" Sony TV in the "family room". I believe we even had a red shag carpet in those days. Sweet!

But either way Fall brings the annual holiday ritual of craving Wild Turkey Surprise and dressing up like a complete idiot to drink a foggy cocktail with your neighbors (you know the scene I'm talking about, with the puggle dressed as a bat and the weiner dog with a butler outfit on). It brings turkey, stuffing and the like.

And I suppose it all started as the season of the bountiful harvest. Sure, now-a-days we think of summer as the bounty because we're used to southern fruits like citrus and nectarines and peaches. But those northern pilgranatives were plantin' away the corn, squash and maybe even a hearty melon. Certainly pumpkins and gourds. Lord knows how much butternut squash an average Pilgrim had to consume in an average Fall.

Anyway, I digress. My point is that I never thought of Fall as the bounty. But now that I'm in the CSA program this is my 4th season since I joined and my first summer into fall. Summer brought lots of goodies like 2-3 melons per basket. Do you know what that meant? Well, since Catherine isn't a big melon-eater (she's a apple, peach, banana, grape kinda girl) I basically eat fruit salad every day. But the gourds are coming from the farm. And the pumpkins. And the apples and pears have already started. We're talking tarts and pies time. Hot food. The goodbye for gazpacho and the hello to goulash.

And maybe that's why I'm glad it's the first day of Fall at last.