Theme Thursday: Orange

Oct. 17, Feast of St. Ignatius of Antioch, bishop and martyr; patron of the Church in the eastern Mediterranean, the Church in North Africa, and throat diseases.





Generally, I only like pure orange in the context of autumn.  As a winter, spring, or summer color, it's brazen and hot, obnoxious and reminiscent of the clashing colors of the late 70's.

So you'd think I wouldn't miss with a mourning ache the color of leaves turning; the bonfire heat and orange-blush of roasting apples; pumpkins that pop from out of white sheets of frost.  I do.  I miss it so, so much.

It's funny because I only lived in the Midwest--and even then, in a place that was really wooded with Goldengroves unleaving--for a handful of years in very early childhood.  But Tolkien talked about ancestral memory; and it fits my mood and personal mythology to say that the northern blood runs copper-bright in my veins, overpowering the mellow Mediterranean of my more recent ancestors, and drawing me to those paleolithic calenders, interwoven with the seasons, like a moth to a flame--so that when I first set foot in the British isles, it was like coming home again after a long journey.

The Welsh have a word for that inconsolable longing: hiraeth.  It translates roughly to nostalgia, but there is no direct equivalent in the English language.  This fading season is hiraeth's incarnation--a brilliant, sharp, painfully joyous passing--while at the same time being in and of itself only a herald of it.  Sweet, sorrowful parting.  Longing for a home not yet found.



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4 comments:

  1. Love. Love love love. Mad props to the Welsh for having a better word for that longing than English does. The closest I've come in our language is John Eldredge's "the haunting." I'll have to remember hiraeth.

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    1. Or Lewis called it "joy"! The first time I read that, I was floored. I was like, I know that. I Know THAT.

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  2. I really enjoy the framing of your photos! Very nice!

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