The Fall

My family is all over the place.

ILs are in Michigan - Current Temp: 59 F

Bro is in Oregon – Current Temp: 55 F

Parents and Sis in Colorado – Current Temp: 57 F

I'm in Houston – Current Temp: Eighty-fricken'-four Degrees Fahrenheit.

I grew up in Michigan, where people know what "seasons" are.  Where in the summer it's hot, in the winter it snows, in the spring, the snow melts and plants return.

And where in the fall, you can put on a cute sweater, go pick apples, buy a gallon of apple cider and a box of cinnamon sugar donuts, eat all of them in one sitting, along with the gallon of cider, run through the falling leaves, feel and hear them crunching beneath your feet, see the colors in the trees, breathe the cool, crisp air, smell that it might snow soon, and jump in a pile of freshly raked leaves.

Fall is when I miss Michigan the most. When the best we can hope for is a cool front to bring the high down to a respectable mid-seventies, I just can't get into the festivities of fall. I need to bake apple crisp, but it's still too hot to turn on the oven. I need to bundle up a little to go outside, but I'll sweat right through my shirt. I want to go pick some apples, but I'd have to drive for hours to get to an orchard. And there aren't any leaves on the ground to rake into a pile. It's OCTOBER and I can't even drink a dark beer because it's TOO D*@( HOT.

/rant.