fall...

I just made some popcorn (I know I just said that below), but it got me thinking about fall and all the things I miss. Yes, it's fall here too, but somehow this year I feel more nostalgic and am more aware of all the things I miss.

I have always missed the changing leaves. The leaves DO change here, a little, but not like in Missouri, with the brilliant reds and oranges and yellows, with the piles of leaves all over the ground to be raked or jumped into or collected temporarily. I LOVED fall at Mizzou when I was in college. I'd always come back from class with a pile of leaves to put in a basket or something. I LOVED the rainbow of colors and still do... or that's what I miss.

Apple picking, making apple pies from the apples in my parents' backyard,... hayrides, campfires, fall camping trips,.... pumpkins, carving pumpkins, pumpkin pies (and being able to make pumpkin pies from canned pumpkin instead of either having to get someone to ship it or bring it over or making them from sweet potatoes or finding a pumpkin and boiling it),... chili, cornbread,... winter soups (okay, that i do make here. i make a ton of tasty winter & fall soups and do make chili on occasion. it's just not the norm and no one else is making chili.).

So, that is my bemoaning about nothing. Fall is the one season (okay, and maybe winter) that I miss here. They were never my favorite seasons, but I miss the snow, the changing leaves, and probably the trick-or-treaters too. I don't actually have any reason to complain. I live in Spain. You can't really compare with that. Yet this fall I'm melancholy and a little sad, not overly nor excessively just a little. And, if you must know, it has to do with a boy that I'm still getting over. (Which probably helps explain a lot of my emotional-ness as of late.) Somehow it seems like it shouldn't take this long, but it is. So that's why I'm all nostalgic and missing home a little more than normal.