But the Moon…Oh, the Moon

Sunday night, September 13, was the Harvest Moon. Midway through my routined NPR listening, I was informed of this and made a point to go out and try to get a glimpse of it through the bright city lights. What a wonderful night for it! The temperature had dropped considerably and the fog had not rolled across the Bay yet. Clear, cool, pristine, quiet.

Specifically, the Harvest Moon is the full moon closest to the autumnal equinox, and what makes it special is the time that it rises. It comes up with very close proximity to the sun going down. And thus making a very short time of darkness, if any at all, between the two. Farmers would use this phenomena to their advantage with Artemis and Apollo united again above them to bring in their crops.

There was no trouble in seeing the moon. It was, as they say back home, “as big as all get out!” I could not see very many stars, but the moon… oh, the moon. A short distance from my apartment, I got it in my sights and I stopped in my tracks. I was entranced. This has always happened to me. When I was growing up, from my bedroom window, I would watch it’s slow arc and let my thoughts wander through the day’s events, gliding to farther memories or swirl forward to future wonderment. Sometimes for hours, I would moon over the orb. Ultimately returning to bed for exhaustion, disappearance behind clouds or over the house, or quizzical parental units.

But now its gettin late, And the moon is climbin high, I want to celebrate, See it shinin in your eye.

I have always cherished this time of year. The shorter days, the cooler temperature, the slowing down, it all triggers a mental inwardness, introspection. Granted, I have been accused of “living in my head” but this is different. Introspection is not being reticent, withdrawn, or even farouche. For me it has always been a personal inventorying of the year past and curiosity of what is to come. To take into account the successes and the disappointments. To learn from mistakes and missteps and attempt to revive merriment from a joyous memory. It seems a natural process. Everything has seasons, even human emotions.

We are spoiled here in the Bay Area. The temperature is an average of 60-70 degrees all year round. There is little alteration in the outlook. People love it. They speak of the weather not in small talk ways but like they are recounting their favorite book. So much so, that any major change in it sends them into a general malaise. As soon as the sun breaks through the clouds, the spirits are lifted and all is well. It can seem a bit childish. This is of no great surprise.

The Bay Area has some of the most desired zip codes in America, present economic woes notwithstanding. The residents know this and treat living here like its a club. An exclusive club. A VERY exclusive club. Where you get whatever you want, when you want it. And if you do not get it you pout, become irritable, or even belligerent. Like that spoiled child, the Bay Area does not pause to reconsider their actions, to put things into a larger scale. Just focused on the infantile demands.

I have found myself slipping into this mindset and I don’t like it. I suppose living somewhere for a while, you start to pick up idiosyncrasies. It is this self-revelation that appeared to me in this Harvest Moon. My wandering thoughts also remembered the frost-covered September mornings, the shock of oranges, reds, and yellows in the hills, the extra blankets for sleeping, and visible breath of the Commonwealth.

I have become fairly homesick. I can’t shake it. The thing that is really getting to me is the lack of physical change in the environment around me. There is only more of the same. Even today’s rain (the first since I don’t know when) had little impact on me. I guess the honeymoon is over. Can you have too much of a good thing? Maybe.

I don’t know how long I stood on that corner staring heavenward. I was shaken out of my enchantment when a pedestrian happened by. He was walking his dog and was looking at anything but the Moon. “Evening,” he said as more of a reaction than a conversation. “Hello,” I said. “Cold enough for you?”, he asked. “Not nearly enough,” I responded and turned home, humming the below song.