I've fallen out of love with summer. Fall is now my favorite season.

Summer has ended. Fall has arrived. I used to think that the end of summer was a melancholy time. I lived in eastern Idaho. Summertime (especially nights) were filled with crickets and the concrete driveway of the house I lived in was warm well past sunset. You could walk barefoot everywhere, and there was fresh fruit aplenty at fruit stands, on trees, and in grocery stores. I dreaded the return of winters where you had to scrape windows, shovel driveways, and everything that used to be green was just dead. Gray branches clawing at the sky, and it being so cold that it was painful just standing around in it as you felt the skin on your face peel back.

But that's how it used to be. My relatives in the south would tell me that fall was their favorite time of the year. The reason why? Because it was the end of 4+ months of temperatures over 90 and all the bugs from hell would thence return to that place and leave the locals in peace. And people could open their windows for the first time since the spring pollen explosion.

And now that's the way I feel. I love fall. But I don't live in the South. I live in northern Utah, which isn't too far from my roots in East Idaho. Things have changed. Summer (which used to be as I described in the first paragraph) has become 4+ months of temperatures over 90, bugs, and concrete and asphalt that is so hot you can't even safely walk pets outside. The brutal temps in my yard are so high during those four plus months that I don't ever open the windows and the air condition runs almost non-stop. We keep all of the window treatments closed against sunshine, and we try not to turn on many lights. This is what summer has become. And based on what I've seen in America, it's a lot worse for other people out there. I can't even imagine what the people in Phoenix, Arizona went through this year, with something like 47 days of temps above 110 degrees Fahrenheit. That's just mind-bogglingly hot.

So here's to the pumpkin-spice lovers of fall. The days are getting shorter, but maybe that's a good thing because it means that it's not so bright outside at 5 a.m. in the morning when I'd really like to get in that extra two hours before work starts. And with the scorching hot summers, winters don't last as long as they used to. It won't be cold here until late November or early December. Even if that isn't the way it is supposed to be, I kind of like the fact that there are really only two freezing cold months (December and January) where I live. And one last blessing is that the lawn grows a lot slower in the fall (if at all). 

Anyone else embracing fall this year (that used to absolutely adore summer)? If so, I'd like to hear why in the comments.