I Love Autumn

     I love autumn. I love autumn in the springtime, summer, and winter. I
 love autumn all year long. Not because the leaves begin to fall which
reminds me that winter is coming but because it is my glorious birth month.

     It was a perfect September day in the middle of the Depression
when my parents welcomed their newborn baby daughter into
the world. It was the first day of school in the small rural community in
Tamo, in southeast Arkansas, and students were being welcomed back
to school. Junius Marion Futrell was the governor of Arkansas. Franklin
Delano Roosevelt was the President of the United States.

     My father, Willis, all of twenty-one was nervously expectant as
he waited on the front porch of his small country home. Mama
Chester, my maternal grandmother, was there to give comfort to Mary
and assist the midwife. She would not have missed welcoming her first
grandchild into the world for all the gold in Fort Knox.

     A lot of people in the cities were out of work. The stock market
crash had thrown the country into a depression. But Willis and Mary
were tenant farmers. They continued to farm, grow their own food and
were never hungry.

     To get the country out of the depression, FDR, as the president
 was called, started a lot of alphabet programs like the WPA( Works
Progress Administration) and CCC, (Conservation Civilian Corp.),
under the New Deal to get people back to work again. Social Security
was born and shares my birth year.

     Later when my mother would point out to me my birthplace from
Highway 65 South, near a thicket of trees, I was in awe. "You kept me
alive!" I would say. Of course it was not just my young parents. It was
Cuz who came to feed me when I would not eat; it was Uncle Jerry,
my father's brother, who bought my first store bought diapers; and
Mama Chester, who hand made me all those pretty clothes.

     Autumn brings back memories of school days at St. Peter's
Catholic School in Pine Bluff. The beginning of school was full of
excitement and welcoming back by the nuns and Father Kempinski.
the principal. I would arrive the first day in my new saddle oxfords,
bobby socks, and the latest sweater set and skirt.

     The first social event of the school season was my birthday
party. Kids came from miles around. My sister, Jettie and I knew every
kid from Main Street to Ohio. My mother baked the cakes. Sometimes
Aunt Margaret, my mother's sister, would come up to Pine Bluff from
her country home in Grady to assist with the preparation. The ice
cream was made in the hand cranked freezer; it was always vanilla.
Today, my favorite ice cream remains vanilla.

     I love autumn because the leaves dazzle in a parade of colors:
red, orange, rust. I look out into the woods in my back yard and see
the trees on the creek next to my neighbor. I marvel at the breathtaking
sight. Only God can make those colors, I say.

     I love autumn. What a relief from the oppressive Ohio summer
heat. The temperature cools down. The sky is azure blue. It's a time
for Halloween and trick-or-treat, with little ones dressed in their
colorful and sometimes, scary costumes. It's a time for Thanksgiving
turkey and all the trimming and giving thanks, for family, friends, and
so many blessings.

     During the snowy cabin fever days of winter, I day dream about
autumn. It is indeed a long, long way from December to September. But
autumn will  surely come again.