Autumnal Colours

20th September 2024

It’s been a great week in the schools and college. The rhythms are certainly well established and the routines have followed. Well done and thank you all.

It’s been quite a lovely week out there too. The weather has been almost summer-like; although it’s been cold in the morning, the afternoon warmth has been very welcome. It’s all due to change this weekend and we’ll feel that shift. It will feel much colder and there’ll be some more damp weather. Pretty typical for this time of year. As we might expect, it’ll all feel decidedly autumnal. Our meteorological autumn does begin this weekend. As you’ll all know, the Earth is tilted on its axis. This means that the Sun illuminates the northern or southern hemisphere more depending on where the Earth is along its orbit – why we get summer and winter. However, at two points in the year the Sun will illuminate the northern and southern hemispheres equally. These are known as the equinoxes. The autumnal equinox is precisely at 12.44pm GMT (1.44pm BST) on Sunday.

And many of you will have observed this week’s Harvey Moon (the full moon closest to the equinox), so called as it was said to enable farmers to work later into the evening, when collecting crops and fruit.

There will be some of you who feel decidedly down at the start of autumn, as it does usually mean a decline in the weather, marks the long school/college year and brings darker, longer nights. However, I know that there are many of us, me included, who do love the autumnal period. There’s a magical light at this time of year, especially early morning and at sunset. This can beautifully light the landscape and bring to the fore the natural wonders of the changing colours of the vegetation. If you do get out and about, not only are the colours of leaves on the trees so wonderful, you’ll see incredible fungi, newly migrating birds and there’s fruit to be harvested.

I really do hope that you can feel upbeat and positive about the coming weeks and months. We should all take time for ourselves and to enjoy the changing seasons – summer cannot and does not last forever!

‘The season of mists and mellow fruitfulness’ John Keats

 And if that’s not enough for you (and please don’t panic) but Sunday does mark 100 days until Christmas – that means I’ve 99 more days until I need to start my Christmas shopping.