I’m in northern Minnesota (same place, nearly same time as last year) working from my little camper just yards from a tranquil lake amidst the aspens, pines of some kind (I can never remember which–the needley kind), and occasional maples showing bright oranges and reds. Along the North Shore of Lake Superior, not much color is showing yet, but as you move inland where I am—25 miles or so from the biggest freshwater lake in the world by surface area—the temps are less stable from the lake effect and the chlorophyll has begun its retreat, revealing nature’s fuller palette.
I’ve been extremely busy at work lately, but sometimes in the morning and each night after 5 I fish. Fishing hasn’t been great, but I’ve caught half a dozen rainbow trout—two last night, which was fortunate because I’m down to sandwiches and canned food at this point after a week in the woods and poor food planning, so trout has been a sometimes tasty alternative.
This evening on a drive to a nearby lake, I saw something in the road in the distance, an eagle, I thought at first, because it was elevated. Admittedly, I wasn’t wearing my new glasses, and I quickly realized what I was seeing were the antlers of a huge bull moose.
After 23 years of living in Minnesota, I have finally seen my first Minnesota moose.
I’d seen plenty when I briefly lived in Alaska, but it’s no less majestic any and every time you see a wild creature like that, just doing his thing. I stopped and watched him as he trotted across the road and into a clearing, then turned and looked at me with his huge glassy eyes as I looked at him with my squinty ones, and I thought, what a lucky sonofabitch you are not to have to read the news everyday. Then he went on to do his thing and I mine. He’s probably off blogging somewhere like it’s 2006 still.
Last year at this time I had something published in the Star Tribune that I was searching my blog for, only to realize I never posted it, and since I’m not sure I could say it better a second time around, here it is, my tribute to fall colors in Minnesota.
The only difference this year is that I’m not planning on taking my camper anywhere—I’m going to grunt out the winter like a true Minnesotan, ice fish and cross-country ski again for the first time since 2022, and otherwise be cooped up and inevitably depressed. But I have plans for a writing project, and I think I need to stay put to do it.
The chlorophyll will be destroyed
Fall in Minnesota to me has always been like the call of the loon: A cue for contemplation tinged with a little melancholy and a reverence for beauty, but not without some sense of foreboding for what is soon to come, that which shall remain unnamed.
It won’t be long before Minnesota’s temperatures dip decisively and the leaves accelerate their flight from trees that send them on their way once the heavy lifting is done, during what must be the most ruthless of times in the leaf/tree relationship.
I’ve always found it interesting that leaves turn so beautiful this time of year not because some new pigment is produced in the leaf, but because something is taken away to reveal what has been there within the leaves all along.
More scientifically, the U.S. Forest Service reminds us that “During the growing season, chlorophyll is continually being produced and broken down and leaves appear green … in autumn, chlorophyll production stops and eventually all chlorophyll is destroyed. The carotenoids (the yellow, orange and red colors) and anthocyanin (the blue, red and purple) are then unmasked.” That is beautifully said, U.S. Forest Service.
Personally, I wish the leaves would change color and stick around, then go green again with the spring sunshine. But it’s not meant to be, says University of Minnesota Duluth leaf expert Jessica Savage, since “Unlike us, trees cannot go inside in the winter and need to prepare for the cold … . [C]olor change and leaf drop is part of this acclimation process.” She said the “W” word, not me.
For my money, maple trees are where the true artistry of fall comes into its own. Leaves that are deep crimson, orange, sunshine yellow and more — sometimes bleeding these various colors together all on the same leaf — let go to grace canvases of still-green grass. If you are poor in eyesight or squint, it is easy to imagine the ground is covered in what appears deliciously like sherbet, though unfortunately at precisely the time of year when ice cream and other warm weather snacks are going out of favor.
And so fall to me feels like the end of something, and I’ve never been good with endings. It is the end of the good months: the spring, summer and autumn months when the sun shines and beckons us beyond our living-room TVs into the great outdoors.
That other season is just fine, of course, and I enjoy it in its own way, but here in Minnesota, let’s be honest: With nearly half the year under threat of snowfall, the fourth season is like a cousin who unfortunately lives nearby, and though we don’t much like him, our mothers would kill us, and so we invite him to holidays out of guilt, where he arrives early and overstays his invitation.
And winter (I’ve come to terms and said it now) is nothing if not an overstayer. Sure, it brings with it new beauty, but in the cities what it brings is bound to soil itself under the salt and sand and endless vibration of urban living. So I’d like to request a revision: What winter deserves is nothing more than the months of December, January and February. And on occasion, we will give it half of March, but then it simply must go and give way to the seasons that allow us to see our neighbor’s faces and for the sun to see our skin.
In any case, Minnesota’s fall color finder map, a gift from our Department of Natural Resources that I look forward to every year, is currently ripening, and the next week or two up north will welcome thousands of leaf-peeping Minnesotans to peak fall colors. I personally took to the North Woods last weekend, along with thousands, maybe tens of thousands of other Minnesotans. Along the North Shore near the photogenic Bear and Bean lakes — which, since Instagram, seem to have more traffic than New York City — hundreds of cars lined up for miles along the highway waiting for a turn on the popular hike.
In the Twin Cities, we still have a while to wait, but eventually that fall color map will wither and brown as temperatures take a polar plunge and the trees go naked in preparation. Of course, winter doesn’t officially begin until Dec. 21. But we know in our hearts the inevitable: The chlorophyll will be destroyed.
Yet underneath the coming snow and darkness, I suppose we can take comfort that something waits. Something that has been there, underneath, all along.
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