Dad and Autumn
My dad always loved this time of year. The smell of drying leaves, wood fires burning, and the crispness of the frost in the early morning sunshine always made him smile. I remember getting up early on days like this to do stuff with dad. On a day like this, we could be off on any number of adventures. Maybe we were going to a skull session at St. John’s Arena. Or maybe it was opening day for pheasant and we had to get out in the field. Sometimes we would just be off on a day trip to some site that seemed interesting. Usually, the destination was determined by dad. He had a way of acting like we had the choice but in reality, if you suggested a place that he didn’t want to go, he would crinkle up his one eye and put on a half smile and breath in through his teeth, making a hissing noise. In the end, we went where he wanted to go.