Autumn Light

I had an opportunity to be out of the office around midday yesterday, the first day of November. As I drove down Brandon Avenue, from Towers Shopping Center heading toward Grandin Avenue, several things hit me. First, the warm fall day. It was a delightful 60 degrees and zero humidity. Second, the light was exquisite. The lack of humidity, the cloudless sky, and the angle of the sun made the light seem crystal and riveting. Third, the colors of the leaves were full out. Even as the leaves on the trees are thinning now, moving into November, the colors are explosive reds and oranges and yellows. As I passed Brambleton Avenue, the confluence of light, temperature, and color proved nostalgic - for college, for high school, for those days when nothing much mattered other than the next date, test, or game.

Driving home from work yesterday was another study in atmospheric collage. The cloudless sky of lunch had given way to wisps out of the west - low swooping ribbons of clouds hunkering down on the ridges to the south and west. As the sun dropped lower, below the mountains, the wisps of vapor exploded in oranges, pinks, and deepening reds. The faint ocher of the autumn leaves on the hills descended into darkness as the light show above grew, glowed, and finally glimmered out.