Boyle McCauley News

Since 1979 • April-May 2024 • Circulation 5000

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My Favourite Month

For a long time now, September has been my favourite month. When I was a kid, what I liked about it was that two long months of mosquitos and unbearably hot nights would turn to windy, colourful, and cool nights where I could sleep comfortably. I also secretly liked the idea of going back to school. Summer can be wonderful, but for a nerdy kid like me school days can be even better.

The idea of going back to school didn’t just mean seeing my friends again and playing all kinds of fun games from football to tag to soccer and basketball – it also meant I would get to do fun math problems and push myself to learn new things. To me, math class was like doing a Sudoku or a crossword puzzle. I always saw the fun in it.

I will never forget the first September I experienced when I wasn’t going back to school. I felt so alone and empty. It felt so strange that another exciting school year was starting and I wouldn’t be a part of it. So, for some time now, I have been taking part-time classes, always trying to educate myself, to get that puzzle-like fun in my life. I have taken drafting courses, writing courses, psychology courses, law enforcement, and journalism courses. It doesn’t totally fill the gap, but it goes a long way.

For the past couple years I have also really enjoyed September because I am now on the verge of being a professional writer, and in the summer everyone is away or dealing with different things and it is hard to book public speaking engagements, sell books or do any of the things I have to do to make my living. September means that everything will start up again and go heavy until Christmas.

September can be such a beautiful month. When I was a kid, each fall in late September my dad would drive our family to Drayton Valley just to look at all the fall colours. I love the changing foliage, and I even love the feel of crunchy leaves under my feet. I can often be caught walking in the gutters just to do so.

Lastly, September is a time for me to set aside more time each day to read. I love to open up a book, sometimes action, sometimes poetry, often short fiction, and just sail away on dreams of other places, other people, things I may never experience.

September has always been my favourite month for a lot of reasons. I hope this article can help others not to let September get them down. The end of summer may be sad in some ways, but the arrival of September is the prelude to great things, like winter sports, skiing, skating, sledding, hay rides, and hot chocolate. Also, there is ice fishing, Halloween and Christmas and New Year’s, and of course, Thanksgiving. What would we do about all of those wonderful things if we never had a fall or winter? Without September, things just wouldn’t be the same.

Leif lives in McCauley.

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