An astonishingly moody drive through the Great North Woods of New Hampshire this afternoon before edging into Quebec. Whereas the coastal corner of Maine that I call home has yet to see a proper autumnal transformation (it usually hits full peak in about another week), this relatively high altitude (800 metres) corner of the northeast was already crimsoned and rouged. But the sky overhead had turned threatening after lunch in a café in the exceedingly pleasant Maine mountain village of Bethel. Rolling north, gaining considerable altitude (the mercury dropping to eight degrees centigrade), dark ominous clouds moved in. Perhaps because I was wearing sunglasses - as the glare had been consistent until I crossed into this high country - the leaves here took on an almost hallucinatory coloration. Here autumn had already arrived with tonal brio. And perceived through light brown tinted lens, the visual intermingling of impending storminess with wild bursts of arboreal timbre was compelling. How often in life do we get to see a visual representation of the ongoing negotiation we all have with darkness and light, the rapturous and the sinister? And it caused me to consider how those things menacing also have an interesting aesthetic that can hold one in thrall... even though we also know that surrendering to its pull is also to move into the shadows for a spell far longer than a drive from coastal Maine to Montréal.
Posted on: Mon, 23 Sep 2013 23:15:39 +0000
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