Welcome, Autumn! (#solstice #memories #newengland)

Photo by Lisabet Sarai

Today is the autumnal equinox, the first day of fall. Here in the perpetually steamy tropics where I live now, it doesn’t feel much like the cool, crisp, luminous autumns I remember.  However, just the word “autumn” brings back vivid memories of my years in New England, where the season can take your breath away with its beauty.

In celebration of the day, I’ve got a snippet from my short story “Making Memory” which captures some of the glory of the northeast (Maine, in this particular case) during the fall. You can read the full story in my F/F collection Her Own Devices.

I looked up and down the two lane road, thinking to hitch a ride to the next town. The cracked tarmac was empty. All I could hear was bird-song and the breeze, whispering of the evening to come.

With a sigh, I retrieved my overnight bag from the trunk, locked the car, and began walking in the direction I had been headed. I hoped that I would come upon civilization before my flimsy Italian heels disintegrated.

Late afternoon sun slanted across the fields lining the road. The crisped remains of summer tangled in the steel safety cables: Queen Anne's lace curled into brittle fists, shaking themselves at me; milkweed spilling silk into the mild October air; tall grasses heavy with seed. The breeze was fragrant with the sun-baked, browning vegetation. And the sea was not far off. Mixed with the field smells, I caught the faint tang of salt and seaweed.

The beauty of Indian summer penetrated my distraction, soothed my irritation just a bit, eased the tight knot of unshed tears. A whippoorwill called, prematurely. Ten minutes into my walk, I entered the village of Spruce Point.

It was not much of a town: a grocery, a gas station, a store advertising ‘Antiques’, and a white-spired church, grouped around a miniature green. At six thirty PM on an October Sunday, all the commercial establishments were shut tight. I was newly disheartened by the ‘Closed’ sign on ‘Ray's Auto Service’. How in the world would I get my car fixed? I had to get home. I had a critical meeting first thing Monday morning.

Behind the gas station, sharing a drive, there was a white clapboard house with green shutters. Bold in my desperation, I knocked on the door. It was answered after a moment by a gnarled, skinny figure. His chin bristled with stubble, but his eyes twinkled in his furrowed face as he gave me a warm smile.

"Good evening, young lady. Can I help you?"

"Are you Ray?" His oil-stained work clothes strongly suggested that he was.

"Yes, ma'am. Thirty years experience, at your service."

"I'm sorry to bother you, but I blew out a tire about half a mile up the road. The thing totally burst. I really need to get back to Boston tonight. Can you replace the tire for me? I know that you're closed for the evening, but it's an emergency. I'll be happy to pay you extra."

Ray looked me over. I could imagine what he saw: a slender, athletic woman with short, dark hair, designer suit and chocolate silk blouse, Gucci bag, impractical shoes. City folk. He grinned. "What kind of car?" he asked.

"Honda Accord."

"Miss, I'd love to help. But I don't generally stock tires for little foreign cars. 'Round here, folks seem to prefer full-size Ford station wagons, or Chevy pickups. I can get you a new tire from Thomaston, but not until tomorrow."

He must have seen the dismay in my face, because he patted my shoulder kindly. "Look, I was just fixing my supper, but if you'd like, I can go out now and tow your vehicle back here to the garage. That way, it'll be safe, and ready to be worked on as soon as I can get hold of the replacement."

I began to protest that this was unacceptable. I had to get back to Boston. Then I realized that it was futile. I could take a bus, perhaps, if I could get this man to drive me to Portland, but then my car would be stranded.

With a sigh of resignation, I nodded. "I'd be very grateful for your help. But please, finish your dinner first." I suddenly realized that I was ravenous. I had taken lunch with Dad in the nursing home dining room, but although he ate heartily, I had no appetite. "Is there a hotel anywhere around here?"

Ray considered the question. "Well, there's Maggie's place, the Bellweather Inn, down at the point. She's closed for the season, but I expect she wouldn't mind airing out a room for you. I can run you down there before I head over to get your car."

"What about your dinner?" I said, eager to find bed and food, but not wanting to seem impolite.

"Just franks and beans," he said with a grin. "I can heat it up again."

We piled into his tow truck and he headed south through the town. Soon the peaked roofs, shutters and picket fences gave way again to autumn-burnished fields. He turned east onto a dirt road marked with a weathered signboard.

Up ahead I saw a building, silhouetted against the fast-darkening sky, flanked by two tall evergreens. "Them's the spruces that gave our town its name," Ray commented.

We pulled up outside the inn. It was as weathered as the sign, but despite the graying shingles, it gave an overwhelming impression of solidity. Perched right on the rocky point, it had a wraparound porch that overlooked the surf-splashed cliffs on one side, a gently sloping lawn on the other. To the left of the driveway, I saw a well-tended garden, still bright with drooping sunflowers and brilliant purple chard. Lights shone in the ground floor windows, welcoming me.

Places I Remember

There are places I remember
All my life, though some have changed
Some forever, not for better,
Some have gone, and some remain.

--In My Life by Paul McCartney and John Lennon

My husband and I were having a Mexican dinner the other night. "Remember the Forest Cafe?" I asked him. "That funky Mexican place on Mass Ave in Cambridge?"

He didn't. As I tried to describe it to him, however, I realized that I wasn't seeing the actual place in my mind. What I was seeing and remembering was my fictionalized version. There is a scene in my novel Incognito set in this restaurant. Now when I try to recall the place, how it was laid out, its atmosphere and decor, it's that scene that comes to mind. The fiction has become more vivid for me than the reality.

I've blogged before about the fact that I'm very place-oriented in my writing. Nearly every story I've written is set in a specific locale, often a place that I know well or have at least visited. I never realized, though, how persistent my mental images of my settings become--strong enough to override or distort actual experience.

Raw Silk includes a scene in a luxury Bangkok hotel called the Montien. The hotel actually exists; many years ago I may have entered the lobby once or twice. Now when I think about that hotel, I clearly recall going up the elevator to the hotel room itself. I remember the thick carpets that mute my footsteps. I can picture the layout of the room, with its floor-to-ceiling windows, the king sized bed where Kate finds wrist cuffs and a collar awaiting her, the mirrored vanity where she watches as Gregory takes her from behind. I could draw a map. It's as vivid as if it happened yesterday--although it never happened, not in the real world at least!

Other authors talk about the way they imagine their characters. I suddenly understand that I see the places where they act out their passions, more clearly than their faces. It's quite bizarre.

I could offer many examples. I just finished writing a Christmas story set in western Massachusetts, where I lived for many years. The two heroes own a house that's mentally borrowed from one of my neighbors, a two-hundred-plus year old farm with the typical rambling barn and so on. However, I added a few touches: a row of evergreens in the yard, a big oak tree, a hot tub on the (non-existent) deck, just out of sight of the street. Now, I can almost feel the alchemy happening, the imagined details distorting my memory of the real ones. I'm willing to bet that in a few months, I'll believe that our thrifty, staid neighbors actually did have a hot tub where they lounged naked under snowy skies!

Sometimes, when I haven't looked at one of my stories for a while, I'll forget the names of the characters. But I never seem to forget where they met, or kissed, or fought. Those scenes are etched clearly into my brain. I rather wonder what this says about me. In any case, I guess it explains why my work has such a strong sense of place.