Every season has its magic. For winter, it’s when the snow blankets everything — crisp and clean and sparkling and perfectly white — and the whole world feels muted, like it sits in quiet contemplation; it feels like a long exhale after holding your breath. For spring, it’s when everything blooms; the colors are soft but beautiful, the fragrance of the blossoms hang in the air. For summer, it’s when the sun sets on a long but crystal clear day, and the heat is just beginning to fade and the evening breeze wafts by and the crickets start their song in the thick grass and the lightning bugs dance overhead.
For autumn, it’s when most of the leaves have changed but not fallen, and our rolling hills are a riot of fiery colors. It’s that final blaze of glory that brings all the shades of the sunset into the daylight to make up for the longer nights. It’s the whirling dervishes of leaves that swirl across parking lots and streets and make you finally understand the lyrics to “Colors of the Wind.” It’s that rattle of gusts through the treetops particular only to the fall, and the crunch of curled brown leaves under your boots. It’s the shower of bright yellow, gold, vibrant orange, vivid red and deep crimson raining down like confetti — nature’s last hurrah before turning in for a well-deserved rest.
There are certain places in West Virginia that can take your breath away. We all know one. Spots that are too beautiful for pictures to do them justice. The old bar that feels lost in time on a foggy morning. A shimmering creek that sparkles more than any diamond in the summer sun. Roads that crest a hill and, as you emerge from the tunnel of overhanging branches, the whole of the world emerges and seems to lay at your feet; you can see for miles and miles and you’re just awestruck by the splendor. Nearby hills roll from rounded peaks into deep valleys and in the distance, the ancient mountains fade blue and hazy and timeless. Though the exact view changes with the seasons — a patchwork quilt of warm colors in the fall, barren but beautiful and front-tipped in the winter, coming to life with pastel buds and blooms in spring or lush and verdant in the summer — it’s never any less stunning.
Sometimes it just strikes you: That this is “Wild and Wonderful West Virginia.” And for a moment you feel lucky and thankful and at peace.
There is much right now to bring us down — make us stressed and mad and sad; make us rage and grieve and want to give up — so it’s nice to be reminded that there are still simple joys to take pleasure in. That there is still beauty worth fighting for. The world was made for change and so are we. Keep going.
