BY FEEL AND CHILL AND TOUCH,

IS THINKING FALL TOO MUCH?

A touch of fall, y’all.

Weather casters say it’s here.

A touch, that is.

So if a touch is here, can full fall be far behind?

Hear! Hear!

Is it here?

Or just near?

Near enough to tempt?

Goodness knows everybody seems ready.

Bye, sizzling summer.

Take humidity with you.

Hello, fall.

Been lookin’ for ya.

Football is here.

Spicy pumpkin drinks and eats ‘n’ treats are all about.

Lattes? Pies?

Have been for days ‘n’ days.

So where is the colorful foliage?

The light sweaters?

Bonfires?

Wiener roasts?

And, what’s more, s’mores?

Harvest Moons?  (Actually, Harvest Moon this year will come in October. September’s full moon is known as Full Corn Moon.)

Could it be that each year about this time we get a bit overly-anxious for fall’s arrival?

Something, at least for those of us of a certain age, akin to kiddos awaiting Santa Claus?

Officially, fall arrives Sept. 22.

Officially, days then get shorter.

Nights longer.

Impatience for fall at full measure.

And then some.

What does Ol’ Roger’s Almanac say?

Fall really arrives minutes before the first Friday night football game in October.

Despite what the calendar says.

Take it from me, the wise octogenarian.

Or is it wiseacre?

Anyway, take it to the bank.

That’s the night to take a wrap to the football game.

Wonder if they’re selling hot chocolate at the hot dog stand?

That’s the night you’ll know it’s really here.

The night you’ll first think and then say out loud:

Brrrrrrrrr!

The night you’ll stop calling it fall.

Start embracing it, welcoming it, saluting it by its more formal, respectable name – Autumn!

But go ahead, it’s never too early to start enjoying that nip, that touch in the air.

Those irresistible thoughts of fall ‘n’ all.

Maybe just the thought of it will hold you, help quell the excitement of its promised coming until it actually gets here.

Here by hint, by touch right now or still more hot days away, we’re ready for its arrival.

Until it gets here, we’ll gladly accept today’s hint, touch of it.

That familiar nip in the air that delights, proclaims:

It’s coming! It’s coming!

And leave you with this cooling thought:

“It is the summer’s great last heat,

“It is the fall’s first chill: They meet.”

Thank you, Sarah Morgan Bryan Piatt.

Nice touch.

Roger Summers is a journalist, author, essayist and teller of tall tales – and maybe some short ones, too. He is the author of the short story collection: Heartsongs from a Washboard Road.