Shige Essay n.55 - Autumn -
AOI HITORIGOTO #55
- Autumn -
By Kato Shigeaki
This time the essay was really beautiful and poetic, I'm sorry if I couldn't convey it nicely in English...Shige sometimes is too talented for me.
Autumn calms down. The hearts swim with grace, the bodies go lightly with the wind. The season called Autumn. It's my favorite season. That's what I decided time ago. There's no doubt, it's Autumn. Summer is nice too. Winter and Spring have some charm too. But they can't compete with Autumn, with the overwhelming scent of Kinmokusei.
I thought to write about this subject last year too but I missed the right timing. It was also because of the gap between the writing time and the publication one of course, but especially because Autumn is a season that passes in a flash, you think you can seize it but you can't. This year I waited for the perfect time.
In reality the fascination of Autumn is something that anyone can feel. It's a custom to say "The Autumn of OO". I'm sure that even in this month's issue of Myojo there will be somebody answering the question: "This is the Autumn of what?". Hunger, sports, arts, reading...There's no need to say that those are things that you can do in every season but for some strange reason it's under the Autumn's spell that they are mostly satisfied.
If I analyse the reason why I connected sports and hunger to Autumn, maybe it's because during this season there are a lot of holidays, they are also well scattered so you can have more free time. I mean, if you have no free time you can't do sports, read, appreciate arts or have good meals. Though, I'm not an employee and not a student anymore so there's really no difference between working days and holidays to me. Quite the opposite, it's easier that events are in the holidays and that I'm busier on those days. I guess why then.
Maybe it's because of the Summer. Everybody easily understand the feeling of "big opening" of the Summer, I'm quite scared of it though. I don't feel at ease knowing that the high spirits due to the coming of the season will quickly end, but still I live together with Summer. During Summer I don't have free time. Trying to enjoy the Summer, do something because it's Summer...in the end I spend the season binded to this feeling of the approaching ending of the Summer.
When it's over, Autumn comes. Overcoming the Summer I feel born again with the free time of Autumn. I can stop my hasty steps of Summer thanks to the Autumn's red light.
However, I end up to feel a little blue with this speed. It seems that Autumn makes people feel gloomy. If you enjoyed your Summer at the maximum it will hit you right away, I guess everybody are easily depressed by it. I have a soft spot for this melancholy though. Maybe I'm a little intoxicated with myself. Or maybe everybody feel some kind of pleasure at being gloomy. Humans all the same. This is what Autumn taught me.
The dry air, the rain and the wind. When it feels like sinking down, the capricious sky turns into the clear, flourishing Autumn's one. A quiet wind blows into the hearts, the feeling of drinking the whole season. The wind of Autumn, little by little colder as it blows, becomes Winter's one before you can notice. The maples' and the ginkgos' leaves dance, scattering their colors sparsely. And then, the Kinmokusei. Absolutely nothing can compete with them. With the overwhelming scent of Kinmokusei.
Soon it will be Winter. But it's not sad. This season will come after enough sentimentalism, the superb beauty of Winter will strike my balance. The sparkling illuminations of the streets will light brightly the cold atmosphere. Good grief, the seasons really pass way too fast to me!
I think that most of the readers of these essays are girls, I'm glad you read this until the end without Fall...without falling asleep.* Since when were you reading them? Was this the first time? I'm full of doubts like these but please, I'd be so happy if you will read the next ones too. Woman's heart is like an Autumn's sky. Because they're both capricious...I guess this is not the right use of words.
Notes
Kinmokusei: Fragrant olive.
天高く馬肥ゆる秋: It's an epithet of Autumn according to some ancient Japanese saying. Its meaning is more or less: "The Autumn when the sky is washed up and becomes clear and when the horses are hungry again and become fat and strong". (That was tricky, Shige ><)
*Here Shige made a pun: 秋ず・・・飽きずに (Aki-zu...Akizu ni) Playing with the sound "Aki" that is Autumn written with the first kanji and the "Aki" of the second one that means "To get tired of". How cool I am being able to keep the pun in English? Oh oh oh (Sorry I'm having a breakdown lol)