Yep! September 21st, the traditional autumnal equinox (in fact on 22nd this year), has now passed signalling sadly the end of summer.
Here in the E of England it is a bit drier than the west but Aug and Sept weather has been mixed - warm and wet and now cooling off. The grass, bushes and plants have had an amazing growth spurt. Good for Ricc I guess - more business cutting it back but hard work for such as me! I am feeling less free already and like Dave Balead (but to a lesser extent) am looking bleakly ahead to the dark, depressing autumn and winter months, as I do every year. I look forward to that day in late March or April when I realise that the spring optimism has once again alighted on my soul. Until then batten down the mental hatches and ride out the winter.
One winter thing I am looking forward to, though, is a very still, freezing, frosty, crisp night with the sparkling jewels of the heaven scintillating in the black damask bowl of the heavens, in the intense dark of the midnight hour (they turn our street lights out nowadays to save energy), to step naked on the icy sward of our back garden, to walk around and feel the biting chill on my skin and make communion with the night, the trees and the frosted landscape.
John