I hate this weekend. Every second that passes fills me with dread. It’s like death spread over three days. Labour Day weekend. I can’t even say it out loud. In fact, it’s so quiet out that the cicadas, those bugs that `sing`with that constant white noise, are fading, the buzz is no longer long and shrill but short and abrupt. For them, it’s last call at Squirrely McMaggot”s. The cold is coming, so it`s time to drop some eggs and squirt some juice or whatever it is an insect will do to keep next year’s Bugapoolaza a happening event. Finish your concert and take a short flight off that tree you’ve squatted on for 3 months. Jackie Frost is making his way to town. His fat ass is white and fluffy, charming and delightful at first but after a few weeks, he becomes mean and slushy. We hate him. And when he comes, it means we have to wear socks. And when you wear socks, you are also going to have to wear proper shoes. And when you wear proper shoes, you might as well just sign your organ donor card. You know it’s over when the fat wasp can’t even make it into the beer can to drown. Sadness. I love summer so. And flip flops.

But you know what? I’m not going to get all bummed out or ruin your weekend because while summer is great, autumn has its perks. It’s a new start, a chance to reinvent yourself. I remember in Grade 8 was my turning point year of taking the new school year on by the short and curlies. I was a gawky, awkward nerd in Grade 7. But after that summer, I had a new haircut. Short and sassy. A peasant top tucked into a pair of high-waisted white washed super flared jeans. Some kind of leather twine necklace that some boy gave me that summer in Cape Cod. If I could only remember his name, I would be all over his Facebook. Oh you know me too well…of course I remember his name: Brian Bohane from Boston, there’s more than one and I am sure I am just another one his disposable “cicadas.” He was 16, I was 14, and it was my first romance. Ish. And when I say “ish,” I mean he would stare at me at the tuck shop and I would look back, and he would look down at his feet. I would look away, and look back, and he would be looking. When he caught me looking back, he would look away. I would look away. Then when I looked back, he would be looking away. Then when I looked away, and looked back, he would be looking.. This safety dance led to one make-out session on the eve of the end of the vacation that included a one-way genital grope, not mine because earlier that day he saw me at the tuck shop buy a box of Tampax. My first! Tampon! Ever! A bone in the hand is worth a ‘pon in the bush` became my motto. That gave me the power to trot through the hallways in September. It`s all about what you wear, inside and out.

So fall will always be about wardrobe planning. A pair of Frye boots might not make me a different person but it make trudging through the snow a far more powerful beast. So will the cashmere sweaters and the Burberry scarf.

Cicadas, shut your pie holes. Your shrilling vocal text messages disturbs my television watching. And the rest of you bugs and birds, take your business down south via the I-95. Make your needs known down there with the snakes and lizards because it’s over in this neck of the woods. The mice and the raccoons have their own pension plan up here in the north but that`s okay. I got some traps and poison.

And I leave you with this: