Will Summer Never End!!!

Once I read a great book called "The Four Humours". Its premise is that the classical concept of a person being ruled by a dominant humour is true. You take a test and answer questions about your body, eating habits, things you like (oh it's quite thorough) and then it gives you points for each humour. Well the book is compelling and touches me where it counts, right it in the mind, with all its impressive research and allusions to great thinkers of the past. The four humours are Sanguine, Phlegmatic, Melancholic, and Choleric.

Most people have a first and a close second. This is good, a person born with some balance. However, when I added up my score, the other categories had like 3-6 points and MELANCHOLIC had over 20! As I recall Jeremy was a close tie of Sanguine and Choleric, but his were all pretty even.

What does that mean? Well. It means I prefer autumn and winter. Knew that. It means my body prefers sharp tastes, less sweetness in things (dark chocolate). All right. It means that a melancholic person is prone to fits of pure joy and utter sadness, but can be happy and sad at the same time. Check. Also, this person is quite logical and tries to hide emotion. Uh oh. At their worst a melancholic is authortarian, pessimistic, traditional (in a bad sense) blah, blah. However, these traits can also be good. At their best a melancholic is full of life, constantly writing poetry, doing art, creating like wild, and writing and writing. Terrific, I'll take it all.

AND BRING ON THE COLD! ENOUGH! I have had stinking summer for a year, with only a brief beautiful respite when I had two weeks of Boston winter, but that was months ago.

Oh autumn. Where are you? I want to see the trees startle me with their intense bareness and loss. Bony, stripped, reaching up to a grey sky with burnt leaves littering the ground. Oh winter. Pierce me with your cold, your truth. Nights so clear with pure chill that the sky is its most black and the stars their hardest and brightest. Oh come soon. You dear friends, blessed seasons make me feel the most alive of anything in this world.