Last week I was driving hours in the suburb of New England. It is the most beautiful time there. The golden and red foliage brought back all my memories of the time when I was in college at Wellesley, those days of being young, often lost, but full of dreams. In my memories, those dreams were associated with the chilly, damp autumn days in the color rich woods. Autumn is indeed the best season in New England.
Living in Southern California, I haven’t had the strong sense of autumn for a long time. The temperature is in 70’s all year round in my neighborhood and trees remain green. However, I do have something seasonal in my backyard – my exotic mum collection.
There’s a tradition in my home city Chengdu in China – a grand mum show every October. I was exposed to many rare kinds of mums there, which I haven’t seen anywhere else ever since I left China. This spring, I finally found many of those rare kinds for sale on the internet. The nursery is actually in Northern Cal near Sacramento. I planted about 60 kinds and most of them are blooming away now.
As part of the mum show tradition in Chengdu, elementary school students were supposed to write essays about these flowers. This essay topic was unchanged every fall and had been beaten to death. My essay usually started like this:” It is a beautiful sunny day today. We are greeted in the park by mums in all colors and shapes…” The happy mood at the sight of those marvelous flowers remains unchanged. The difference now is: it is always a beautiful sunny day in Southern California, and I have the mum show in my backyard!
