‘Tis the Season – Already

I read several blogs every day … keeping up with what’s happening outside my small world. One I read echoed my sentiments almost exactly. Rue was bemoaning the fact that the day after Samhain/Hallowe’en, Walmart is oversubscribed with Christmas items.

IMHO, retailing is getting more desperate each year. Hallowe’en candy was in the stores in mid-August. (Despite the preservatives, can you imagine how stale it would be by the end of October?) While watching the baseball game Saturday night, I saw a commercial with a Christmas theme. What happened to Thanksgiving?

Once upon a time (and I’m not that old), the retail seasons progressed naturally. We didn’t see Hallowe’en items until late September. Thanksgiving waited until after Hallowe’en and Christmas came out the day after Thanksgiving.

Thankfully, I don’t have to pay attention to the marketing people at the major stores. The trees still have some leaves left (but not many); the days are warm and the nights are cool. It’s still time for apple pies, raking leaves into a pile and then jumping in, or simply dragging your feet through the leaves on the ground and hearing that spectacular swishing/crunching sound.

We haven’t had a hard freeze, yet, so I still have herbs to harvest … I can get another cutting off the wormwood, mugwort and rosemary before covering them up for the winter. It’s nearly time to dig up my two-year-old comfrey and valerian roots. If the current weather holds, I’ll even have another crop of chamomile before everything goes to sleep for the winter.

For me, it’s still autumn. I’ll even ignore the Christmas carols in the stores when I do my weekly shopping tomorrow.