Last year Professor KT Foo sent me a copy of his “2022 Foo Family Calendar”. It is now November, the cranes are returning home, and a year has almost slipped by.
I was born and bred in the tropics. My first experience of the four seasons (while in England pursuing my postgraduate studies) brought new experiences and excitement. I learned in school that Autumn begins on the 1st of September. However, I did not feel anything special on that day. Was it REALLY the start of Autumn? I discovered a few weeks later how to recognise the beginning of Autumn during a BBC programme. Here is how you remember it – when you wake up in the morning, you feel the nippy air of a new season. Yes, Autumn has the habit of arriving suddenly – crisp and golden as an apple. Oscar Wilde said, “And all at once, summer collapsed into fall.” The falling leaves are nothing more than a summer’s wave goodbye.
Jazz lovers smile when they hear “Autumn Leaves“. This jazz standard appeared as the theme song in the movie 1946 film “Les Portes de la Nuit “(Gates of the Night). Joseph Kosma, a Hungarian, composed the music and Jacques Prevert, a Frenchman, wrote the lyrics. They named their work “Les Feuilles Mortes “, which in French means “The Dead Leaves”. I am always intrigued by the infinite number of ways the song is sung or played – perhaps reflecting how the artists feel about the season. The dead leaves? How dreadful! So, what is the autumn mood?
Friedrich Nietzsche noticed that Autumn is more the soul’s season than nature’s. It is the appropriate time to reflect on how beautiful the leaves grow old, full of light and colour in their last days (John Burroughs). Indeed, the trees show how lovely it is to let the dead things go – and appreciate the still melancholy that harmonises life with nature.
We have all noticed colourful flowers belong to spring, and when it comes to Autumn, colourful leaves get our attention. I like the imagination of Albert Camus (“Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower”); the positive attitude of Victoria Erickson (“If a year were tucked inside of a clock, then autumn would be the magic hour”.) Yes, Autumn carries more gold in its pocket than all the other seasons – “Autumn is the mellower season, and what we lose in flowers we more than gain in fruits (Samuel Butler).”
The Autumn leaves fall like they’re falling in love with the ground. I find it hard not to fall in love with Autumn, nature and life.
Vince
Dr Vincent Chong is a retired Professor of Radiology at Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore.
