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Pumpkins! Who else is seeing stacks of pumpkins in the grocery store and feeling that tingle of delight? Or waking up to a chill in the air and snuggling into a soft blanket for a few extra minutes of comfort, or coming home to the sound of fowl making music above them as they come back to their southern home for the winter.
Who else blesses each yellow butterfly that crosses their path on her journey from one alfalfa field to the next? And who notices how many fewer there are this year, and blesses their return even harder?
Who else is praying for that last shower of rain before harvest, or planning a fall feast to celebrate the bounty our blood, sweat, tears and the grace Mother Earth has given us to survive another challenging cycle upon her soil?
Who else is still smiling, still planning, still laughing with their family, still howling at the moon when she hangs big and fat in the sky and praising the sun that still rises and sets each day, who is still sending that good medicine out into the world, maybe without realizing how much she and all their neighbors need that ripple of joy in the atmosphere right now. As joy is contagious, and a laugh can infect a town as quickly as a cough.
Fall is my favorite time of year, even before it became a sacred season, because it is the one my precious daughter chose to make her emergence into this world. Fall is the season in which I first held my baby. Fall is the season of my motherhood. And, Fall is the season when we start to gather, to slowly begin to fall into a slower rhythm, to speak amongst each other with stories and meals instead of the language of toil and hope.
In Navajo, September is Biniʼantʼą́ą́tsoh, and translates into English as “ripening of late crops.” I am not a fluent speaker, so to me Biniʼantʼą́ą́tsoh fills me with a feeling of walking through ripe corn fields, of pushing aside verdant leaves and uncovering a family of squash and pumpkin, of smelling chile roasting, tortillas toasting and a boiling mess of beans. Fall is the scent of mother.
Fall is when I hold an ear of corn and feel the love of my ancestors who grew this same seed before me. Fall is when my belly dances with those sister crops that have kept us New Mexicans going through many generations of winter.
Fall is when we grow our woodpiles and air out the quilts. Fall is when we gather to harvest the dove and duck, and prepare for the later months when we will begin bringing home the wild game that, too, will insure our continuation—that will give our elders and our children the nutrients they need to keep sharing their gifts of memory and imagination into the darkest days of winter and the frost break of spring.
Fall is when I am most reminded of our relationship with our environment, and what a glorious blessing it is that we live in a place that has so much to offer us, even in a drought year, a war year, a year of uncertainty.
Fall is when I feel the most human, the most connected to my place in the ecosystem—the most grateful to all those who work, and sweat and sacrifice all summer to provide nourishment to their neighbors, be them near or far.
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Fall is when I say, thank you. Thank you to the farmers. Thank you to the ranchers. Thank you to the hunters. Thank you to those that care for our wild lands. Thank you to those who have welcomed the bees and bats and butterflies to their homes. Thank you to those who have worked to manage our waterways. Thank you to those that are planning ahead to ensure all are warm and fed and safe this winter. Thank you to the children who make the next few months of the year magical, and the moms, dads, grandparents, aunties and uncles who help make that magic happen— we all benefit from it. Thank you. Thank you to each and everyone one of you who has chosen love and compassion this summer.
