The Gold Underfoot

When I was seven, my grandfather told me that the trees were simply holding their breath until the first frost. We lived near a small patch of woods where the ground would turn into a thick, crunchy carpet of copper and amber every October. I spent hours walking through those leaves, trying to step as softly as I could, terrified that I might wake the forest from its slumber. I remember the smell of damp earth and the way the air felt thinner, like it was waiting for something to happen. I thought the colors were a secret the trees were keeping from the rest of the world, a private display of fire before the long sleep of winter. As an adult, I realize that the beauty wasn’t in the trees waking up, but in their willingness to let go of everything they had spent the summer building. What is it that we are still holding onto that we should have let fall to the ground long ago?

Diana Ivanova has captured this quiet surrender in her image titled Autumn on the Forest. It reminds me of those afternoons spent listening to the leaves shift under my boots. Does the forest look like it is resting to you, too?