You feel it in the air and see it in the trees. That official arbiter, the calendar, claims its summer in Ashland. We in the real world know that autumn has supplanted summer. Whether summer grows aware of this and attempts to heat-blast us one last time, we will see. Weather forecasters present claim we won’t see a high temperature above seventy-nine degrees until September 26. Forecasting temperatures that far out isn’t historically successful.

We feel it, though, as I started out this thing saying. We all feel the air difference and state, “It feels like fall.” Accepting that as the de facto situation, we went out to celebrate summer’s end last night. Lake of the Woods Resort was the location. Colonel Mustard provided the music on the lakeside.

We visited a friend’s cabin for a start. The Civilian Conservation Corps built a few hundred cabins in the thirties and forties. Our friends bought one in two thousand one. It’s beautifully rustic, with minimal updates and upgrades. Everything done to it was completed with a mindset of keeping it resembling its origins. No running water, they have an outdoor shower under the deck and a two-hole outhouse. A small propane furnace was added, so they have some heat to drive out the mountain’s cold.

They provided us a boat-tour of the lake, and then ferried us to the resort. Colonel Mustard were already into their Beatles medley by then, so it was easy to jump up there and dance. Drinks, dining – with an excellent, freshly made mixed-berry cobbler, made and served in an iron fry pan, and topped with three scoops of vanilla ice cream, for dessert – and more dancing followed. The fun, social evening was a wonderful means to say good-bye to summer, and hello to autumn.