Sept/Oct 2025 (Volume 17, Issue 5)

 

By Arvid Huisman 

 

Autumn arrives on time again this year—officially and effectively. A late summer heat wave will likely end abruptly and we will slide into that delightful time of year we call “fall.”

 

This is my favorite time of the year—warm afternoons and cool, crisp nights; azure afternoon skies and a pallet of colors across the horizon. Winter is beautiful with its crystalline trimmings, spring is delightful with its promise of life and summer is fun with its hot, lazy days. None of the seasons, however, delight my senses like autumn.

 

Autumn can be foreboding, its brisk winds reminding us of the long winter just around the corner. As in life, however, we must accept autumn for what it is—one of the seasons God gives us to enjoy. And, like life, the beauty of autumn is where we look for it. For those of us who live in Iowa, one needs not look far. “Among the several kinds of beauty,” Joseph Addison once wrote, “the eye takes most delight in colors.” Perhaps that’s why autumn is my favorite season. There’s color everywhere.

 

The trees; that’s where you’ll find the beauty of autumn. New England can boast of its magnificent fall colors, but Iowa needs not apologize to anyone. Autumn paints not only the acres of wooded hillsides and the lovely groves behind Iowa’s farmsteads, but also the lonely sapling in the backyard. When God looked down on the earth and said, “This is very good,” He must have been looking down at Iowa in autumn.

 

The multi-toned leaves mean work when they fall on our lawns but even there we can find beauty. Watch children pile the leaves into giant pillows and then run and jump into the colorful cushions, having fun in what we adults consider debris. The joy of childhood is a beautiful sight during any season, but especially in autumn.

 

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