BackAutumn in Québec
On leaf-strewn paths, surrendering to the metronomic certainty of nature and reflecting on the cycle of life
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The poet John Keats called autumn the season of “mists and mellow fruitfulness", giving a sheen of colour and last burst of joy before the inevitable end of the year. Americans call autumn fall, and for good reason. It is the time when leaves fall, harbinger of the end of a cycle. It is the moment to surrender to the metronomic certainty of nature, which tells the trees it is time to shed the leaves, become bare, skeletal and austere. It is time to let go. Another season will come, there will be new buds and flowers, but for now, it is time to part.
But that parting does not have to be bitter. The leaves reflect the richness of a life well lived, with a range of colours that defy names. During my time as a student in New England, I grew used to seeing the magic unleashed by nature’s paintbrush, which didn’t seem to have room for gloomy colours. The green would turn olive, then yellow a little, before becoming orange, pink, red, russet and dark brown, and then complying with nature’s narrative, falling on the ground, creating a patchwork tapestry so beautiful that it almost felt criminal to walk on these leaves and disturb these patterns that looked like Van Gogh’s palette. In the woods behind my college, I would walk with my camera, taking photographs of trees getting shorn of leaves. The stick season would begin, and then white snow would cover the trees and drooping icicles glistened like stars.
Last month I was in Wendake, also known as the Huron-Wendat Reserve, outside Québec, in Canada. When I looked out of the window of my hotel room, all I could see were bright leaves, dazzlingly golden. It was as if the trees wanted to reveal their glory one last time, before the leaves went away. I stepped out of the hotel and was walking on a carpet of leaves. The leaves crackled and crunched under my feet, and the only other sound I could hear was the distant rumble of running water. I followed that sound and negotiated my way through the leaf-strewn path. I saw a wooden bridge, and beyond the bridge, the ground sloped downward, the earth slightly wet, as were the leaves.
I looked towards the source of the water. And through the mist, I could see more trees—elm and oak and beech and fir and maple, each with leaves slightly different from the next. The leaves were translucent, and you could see sun filtering through the leaves, casting a golden halo on my skin. If you looked at the leaves, you could see their veins create patterns showing the geometry of their growth. The leaves did not seem to want to fall, and they clung to the branches in breeze, and even when they did fall in water, they tried to float their way back to the ground, perhaps hoping that they could return to the tree, and merge with it, or rise slowly, to take the place that was theirs on that branch.
But the cycle of life is as much about an end as a beginning; what has fallen must part and make way for the next generation, not yet born, lying dormant somewhere within the tree, to stay still during the harsh winter, when the snow beats back any hope of growth and covers these trees. But the sun would regain strength and the snow would melt and new life would begin. And that new life, those leaves, would have emerged from the same branches. It was time for the old leaves to leave, so that new leaves could one day be born, as they would, as they always do.
As I walked back, I couldn’t take my eyes off those leaves lying on the ground. They were old but rich and beautiful. They revealed a range of colours that told the story of a lifetime of experience. When the new leaves would cover the bare branches in their verdant glory, they would all be bright and green and appear the same, eager to grow. But over time they would have their own stories, and the pace at which they would grow would also be their own. And so it is, that months later, when the summer sun would have gone, and the skies and crisp weather would have returned, that those leaves would change colours and fall, as they must.
Another evening in Québec I was on the upper deck of a boat in a river. The wind turned chillier, and we looked at the shore. Each bank was full of trees. At first glance, it looked as though they were smeared with the same colour—that twilight hue between yellow and orange. But when we looked closer, we could see the subtle differences once again—millions and millions of leaves, each distinct, each unique, and yet, together, they created a quilt that mirrored humanity. The river reflected the fading sunlight, and at that moment, with the water shivering with anticipation, the leaves rustled in the wind, some falling, others waving merrily their last goodbye. And so did the sun, desperately waving goodbye from the narrow sliver of light that the darkening sky permitted, through which the rays raced to the banks and kissed the leaves, now aglow, now quivering with excitement. The sun would be back tomorrow, the leaves will return a season later, and this drama will play out, again and again, time after time, as it has always done.
Salil Tripathi writes the column Here, There, Everywhere for Mint. He tweets at @saliltripathi.
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