By early November the hills of the ridges that form the river valley are covered with leafless oak trees. Scattered among this subdued gray background is an occasional individual tree still clinging to its canopy of color . They are the tulip and beech, elm and larch, still not willing to let go.
When they do, after the first snow, the complexion changes with sunshine, rain, snow and rime. The woodlands are now open to the secrets hidden from the casual eye when the trees were adorned with leafy green.
The most intimate of
such secrets are the nests that cling tightly to crown branches. It is where birds lived
before moving south for the Winter.
Walking the woodlands as Appalachian Mountain Country goes into its next season is to tingle to the early morning frosty air. It is to know complete silence in the surrounding forest as time shifts gradually and quietly from one season to the next.
Our field of vision shifts and is filled with a frosty fantasy from patterns on leaf, blade and twig.
A sound attracts our attention and when we turn our eyes to where our ears had been to see a barely perceptible rustle, a few remaining leaves dangle loosely to a nearby oak tree moving gently in a delicate breeze.
Autumn is a lovely licorice lace lady from the top of her head to the tip of her toes. She walks over the leafy brown carpet to stroll among Christmas fern, clumps of rich, dark green mountain laurel and rhododendron for a few weeks then settles down with a variety of white-trimmed fringes hemmed to her wardrobe by Winter snows.
Copyright © 1988, 1999 Barbara A. Smith and John G. Hipps. All rights reserved.
This essay was first published November 2, 1988 in the Free-Press Courier, Westfield, Pennsylvania.