Miles Fink-Debray

Summer has never really been my season.

And I’ve always felt a little strange saying that because it seems to be the season everyone is supposed to love most. The long days, the social energy, the constant activity, the feeling that life is meant to be lived outside and at full volume.

But for me, summer is the trying season.

I absorb so much of what’s around me, and there’s something about the energy of summer that can feel exhausting—everything a little louder, more social, more outward, more focused on experiences, appearances and the next thing happening.

It’s not that I feel pressure to participate. I just feel the energy of it. And after a while, it wears on me.

My life and my values don’t really change with the seasons. I care about the same things all year—family, health, meaningful work, nature, good food, adventure, love, and making my time count.

But then fall arrives, and something just clicks.

The world gets quieter. The mountains get deeper. The air gets crisp. The days become slower and somehow more meaningful.

People seem to turn inward. There’s more room for family, for a long walk, a good meal, a fire at night, an early morning outside, a conversation that actually means something.

And I love that.

It feels like the world around me finally catches up to the way I naturally want to live.

Maybe that’s why fall makes me happier than any other season.

Not because I suddenly become someone different, but because the world feels a little more aligned with who I already am.

Summer is something I get through.

Fall is something I come alive in.

And every year, when it finally arrives, I feel it in my whole body:
there you are. 🍂