The Cycle Of Autumn

By Ava Darwin

Waiting for a reason behind your pain, is like waiting for Godot. Only the realisation doesn’t hit until you’re knee deep in your spiral and continue to believe the world is meaningless. In year seven science class, it was the first time we learnt about the life cycle. There was beauty in watching a butterfly grow, it was like sitting in a rocking chair and watching as the years dance by, watching mother nature scream, cry, be angry, be happy, watch the whole world fall apart in autumn, and rise again in spring, watching this all pass you by, as your hair grows grey, and your wrinkles begin to double. Sometimes I wondered why butterflies lives were so quick and easy, I realised as I grew older that every life is beautiful, you just have to notice the beauty rather than think it. Life is this waiting room, like You’re sitting by the doors, between heaven and hell, and you believe that pushing down everything you did in your life will make you knowledgeable to know what happens next. But no matter how hard you push something down, it never disappears, it worsens overtime and you end up caught in the rip of the cycle again. 

To others, autumn is seen as a break, a pause between summers' drowning heat and winter's harsh coldness, with a few orange trees to counteract. To me, I remember autumn as my favourite season of the year, my birthday at the very beginning, the end of term one approaching us, and beautiful orange trees encapsulating my world, but ever since April fools, ever since we lost my mums best friend, it's as if the world is playing tricks on me. After all these years, autumn has still stayed as my favourite season. Every morning I'm sitting waiting for the bus, every walk I have in the park, every second I spend breathing in the air of autumn's morning breath I feel complete and utter comfort. Then I remember the moment it all fell, like the leaves on the trees around me. It was mid autumn, the first of April to be exact, my best friend and I were playing with our MacDonalds toys, my mum called me into the living room. with tears in her eyes, she told me words I didn’t expect to hear. Ever since that day, autumn has felt like a pause for me too. As if a fork in the path has opened up, and through winter to spring, spring to summer, and back to autumn again, I’ve been stuck at this crossroad. that's when autumn began to freeze and my whole world fell apart.

winter is lonely, your grief takes over, your thoughts surround you till you end up having to force a tear out to feel something other than numbness. When you’re isolating yourself, you believe in nothing, in no one. I remember completely ignoring my friend, skipping class, staying home from school all because I was so frozen in my mind. Theres this complete and utter ignorance to your mental health and the people who care about you. Overtime, winter cracked my skin and scars begin to form. Infront of a frosted over mirror I sat, staring at this thing starring back at me. She was pale, her lips were blue, her eyes were frozen shut with ice all over her cheeks.

That year was hell. As everything crumbled, so did I. And as I fell. So did every relationship I had with anyone. But when spring came around, I felt the hope seeping out of my wounds. Sometimes the euphoric stage can be disguised as hope and new beginnings that you genuinely forget that it is euphoria. I spent the next 365 days feeling nothing but immense happiness. That year was the year I grew to appreciate my scars, to acknowledge how far I had come. But as they began to fade, a question arose, did it count?  It was such a freeing experience, to be able to see my reflection and not frown, to be able to eat normally, act normally. Spring made me feel real, made me feel seen. But between me and my journal, something was off. 

As the heat built up, and the sweat picked up, my neck, my chest, my whole body felt suffocated, as if summer had her hands around my neck screaming, appreciate me!  But what was I even appreciating. Summer brings nothing but having to wear long sleeves and long pants the whole time. One day two years later I realised how suffocating it was. a friend said that I didn’t have to wear them, That I shouldn’t feel selfish, that I shouldn’t be putting my body through this just to hide my past. I trusted her, I told her things I don’t tell others and she went behind my back, behind my friends backs, and fat shamed my entire friend group. She picked a battle with a tired soldier who was very good at ignoring people. So I just gave up with talking to her instead of retaliating. I heave through everyday. I don’t appreciate, I don’t love, I don’t want to be in, summer. But every season, as it comes around, makes my battle harder to fight. Constant switching between all these emotions and always ending back at autumn breaks my whole heart.

Everyone has their ‘Autumn’. that moment in time, that story that sways the way that their future shall continue. Maybe its a first heartbreak, or a family member you’ve lost, perhaps it was when you were bullied when you were little, which ended up in your development of body dysmorphia and insecurities to everything, or maybe it is when you put all faith in one person who just ends up leaving you too. I feel as if everyone’s ‘autumn’ happens when they begin school, when they’re opened up to the world and its horrible excuses of ‘compliments’ and ‘friends’. 

Being stuck in this spiral is like waiting for a doctor's appointment, anxiously bouncing your leg, thinking this is a waste of time. In the end you still wait, because you have to. It's a waiting game, a feeling of being in purgatory, this sense of complete and utter loss and unknowing of where to go next, that is the feeling of when autumn arrives. In every book, every movie, autumn is described as the most beautiful season. But the truth is, that beneath the orange trees the truth is hidden, the truth is that autumn is a cycle, an entire spiral of events, memories, feelings, its full of isolation and unforgiveness. Maybe that's just the dust of her lies digging into your mind, but Sometimes I feel as if autumn will never end. Then winter begins, then spring, then summer and all I remember for those past 9 months is nothing, because the return of autumn is enough to blind me. But the beauty from all of these seasons still lingers, like that scar on your body you got when you were little. Full of loss, one cannot appreciate the beauty standing before us, the thing that is quite literally staring us in the face screaming ‘notice me!.’ Once you’ve dealt with such chaos, once you’ve lived through such seasons, the sun appears again, and she holds you tight, until the moment she has to let you go again. Then you must wait till next summer, to feel this way again.

By Ava Darwin