We tend to think of Fall as the end of the growing season. Yet, in New England or farther south, it can also be a last flourish and a promise to the coming year. In more southern areas, late fall (November) is a time to plant many seeds that need a bit of extra time in the spring. The frost cracks in the soil work the seed downwards. Here in Connecticut, late fall is a time to plant dormant trees. From October through November, planting trees at this time allows them to establish roots without having to support their leaves. For the planter it means far fewer trips with the water bucket. Early fall is a last flourish. The lawn, which has sulked through the summer heat, suddenly starts growing again; the asters, goldenrod, chrysantheums all put on a spectacular show; the garden can produce another round of lettuce and spinach, while things like kale grow much larger.
Early fall is definitely here, the ashes have begun to turn and some of the early birches. A few of the shadblows have started to turn, jewels of gold, amber and crimson floating in the dark green understory. The horse has shed his summer coat and now grows fuzzier and glossier, darker. It seems, always, to happen overnight.
Acair Fearann 
One of the most difficult things about coming to live in the Bay Area of California has been figuring out seasons. Even though I’ve lived all over the country, this is the first place I’ve lived where the seasons bear almost no relationship to what I have been familiar with. Even Houston, with its perfectly horrible climate, had changes that I could correlate with a “normal” winter, spring, summer and fall. The Bay Area, at least for the first few years of experience, does NOT. Winter is colder. But not much colder. “Summer” mornings, with low grey skies, can be downright chilly. One settles in to shiver all day only to find that a complete change of clothes and mindset is required when the sun finally appears in the early afternoon and everything warms up instantly. “Fall” happens, sort of, but the trees that do turn color (sweetgum, for the most part) don’t get around to doing so until almost Christmas and are still dropping their leaves in January – which is “winter”? “Spring” does bring a profusion of wildflowers, but the question of when to plant seeds for such an event is one I really haven’t found a good answer to yet.
I do miss the familiar round of seasons, especially fall with its sense, to me, of new beginnings (that’s the perspective of an inveterate academic, I suppose).