chimes outside my window.

It started to rain again, the temperature dropped, the leaves rustling when the wind blows, chimes clanging together — fall. I turned the corner coming home from the movies and my water bottle sloshed to the other side of the back seat, rolling to another spot, the water cold now, presumably, along with the inside of my car, the heater not yet hot —

When I was in high school fall meant basketball practice. Cold weather, visible breath, meant running for missed layups, meant kicking benches and cussing at missed shots. The leaves turning colors, falling to the ground, the cement, stacking up in the curbs, meant coming home to a cold house, the thermostat at sixty, waiting for me to turn in to 70, so that we could save money, so that mom could pay the bills, her paintings didn’t need the heat.

When it starts to rain I open the window at night. I listen to the rain drops hit the ground, the deck, the window sill. I lay in bed and feel the wet air coming through the screen, the birds that haven’t flown away yet, following the sun like I wish I could, chirp and sing, denying what the clouds have to bring. And even if Gore is right and it might not get as cold as it used to, the mountains might be more bare, the penguins more tan, when I hear it rain outside, when I hear it well up in the gutters, fighting with the leaves that packed themselves into the canals on the roof, refusing to be raked into a garbage bag, I still think about fall. I still think about Oregon.

The last two years the fall has brought me tears. My own rain. The kind that comes from within — the kind that reminds me of chimes in the wind. The chimes are playing outside of my window, fighting to be heard over the fan blowing white noise around in my room, I want to hear them again, hear them in Nature’s Fall. Our five sense can bring fear from the past —

I want this fall to be different. I want it to be good. And I do think it’s a choice.

Let it rain, let it leaf, let the streams swell and the winds play with the chimes — red, green, see through and blue —

– my fear is telling me it’s fall.

~ by kevinthomas on October 7, 2006.