I have said this before, and I am not afraid to admit it again: I don’t love autumn. It’s better than winter – but only just slightly. I would be perfectly content if the weather in New Orleans was always August-hot. I understand that this makes me freakish, but it’s true. In the middle of July, I happily sat on the patio at Ba Chi on Maple Street and sipped steaming hot pho tai while the sun beat down on my head and more than one person asked me if I wouldn’t be more comfortable inside.
But there are a few good things about the season, I guess.
Ruby can wear her adorable monogrammed cardigan to school – some deeply buried prep school part of me just delights in the look of that burgundy sweater embroidered “R. Crawford” paired with her navy blue polo and crisp khaki skirt. (I have a constant sense of lingering sadness that Ruby will not agree to the optional saddle shoes that would complete her uniform, but I can settle for the black Mary Janes that she wears instead.)
We can eat soup again. God, I love soup. As a kid, I ate soup for breakfast every single morning and often took a Care Bears Thermos full of it to school, as well. To me, there is no off season for soup, but to my husband, soup is unthinkable unless there is a nip in the air. In New Orleans, 75 degrees counts as “a nip,” so bring on the soup!
And of course, there’s Halloween. Last week at lunch, I eavesdropped on a couple of young women dining one table over – over the course of a half-hour, they discussed recipes for shrimp étouffée, the Saints, a boyfriend’s recent DUI arrest, and what they were going to be for Halloween. It was quite possibly the most New Orleans conversation ever. I don’t have any particularly raucous plans, but I do have costumes in the works for the girls (and by “in the works,” I don’t mean “I am making them myself”; I mean “ordered from Etsy”). Because I have two girls between the ages of 2 and 8, they obviously will be dressing up as characters from Frozen. Ruby is going as Anna, and she has decided that Georgia should be Olaf. Georgia is too little to really care, and she is also the most agreeable toddler ever, so that’s a done deal.
In my opinion, the only thing cuter than a kid in a monogrammed cardigan is a kid in a costume, so sartorially speaking, this is the best season.
Other than that, I will just be eating soup while wearing a sweater and a scowl, waiting desperately for spring.
