Every winding road and brook and lake in the highlands is replete with color in October, and the hues are so vivid that I cannot find the words to describe them. I stand rapturously here and there with my mouth wide open in wonder, and I marvel endlessly at the riches being held out to me. I wander around in a fog, muttering adjective after adjective under my breath in a puckish seasonal litany, but exactly the right words to capture this autumn experience in the beautiful highlands don't seem to exist in my mother tongue.
There are indeed some lovely words in our lexicon: amethyst, bittersweet, blood red, blush, brick, burgundy, caramel, carmine, champagne, chestnut, claret, copper, crimson, flame, flaming, flaxen, garnet, golden, hazel, heliotrope, honeyed, lavender, magenta, mauve, mulberry, orange, plum, pomegranate, pumpkin, red, ruby, russet, salmon, tawny, tangerine, terra cotta, titian, vermilion, violet, wheaten, wine.
They do not (however) begin to describe the experience of standing by the lake this weekend and seeing Gaia's magnificent creation in vibrant living color. The best word is WOW.
6 comments:
Wow! There's really no other word for how lovely the colors (and your photographs) are. It reminds just how far my colors have yet to turn.
Carolyn H.
http://roundtoprumings.blogspot.com
Beautiful! I can hardly wait for Autumn to hit our part of the world!
Hi Cate,
These photos are astonishing! Would just love to redo the entire house in these colours. This is beautiful mother nature at work indeed...
Cate, a visit to your site is a respite for the soul. Thank you..
Two amazing photographs and I love your lexicon!
How lovely. We don't really get fall color here, just a little dusty yellow when the sycamores turn, and here and there a sweet gum tree someone has planted turns brilliant, but never as brilliant as the color seen farther north. So I'm always happy to see the photos people elsewhere share to help me get a grip on autumn in all its glory.
I like the wind horses too!
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