Going in Search of Autumn

Today is Risshu, the first day of autumn according to the calendar.
But when I open the window, the cicadas are buzzing, and the sun is relentless. What is autumn, anyway?
I wasn't convinced, so I went for a run to find out.

August 7th is Risshu. According to the calendar, autumn begins today.

Risshu is a day that always comes with the caveat 'according to the calendar.' In reality, it falls during the hottest time of the year. They say that from today, the greeting in letters changes from 'shochu-mimai' (midsummer greeting) to 'zansho-mimai' (late summer greeting), but rather than 'remaining' heat, it looks like the heat is just getting started.

Even so, thinking there must be something to it since someone decided it, I went out for a run in the morning.

I regretted it three minutes after I started up the hill. The back of my neck was burning. Sweat gathered at the tip of my chin and dripped onto the stone steps. The sound of the cicadas was so thick I felt like I was moving through a wall. I climbed while searching for autumn, but nothing I saw was autumn. The sky was scorched white, and the grass along the roadside was the color of summer.

When I reached the top, I put my hands on my knees. I could see the harbor. The roofs and the sea were all shining together; it was just dazzling, not cool or anything else. As I caught my breath, a breeze came.

It passed right over the back of my neck.

It was that fleeting moment of coolness when sweat dries. I think the wind itself was lukewarm. It only felt cool because it passed over my wet skin. Logically speaking, that was all it was, but I let out an 'ah'.

I waited for a while, but the next one didn't come. The cicadas were buzzing at the same pitch.

As I ran down the hill, I thought that I wouldn't have noticed that if I hadn't been running. If my skin hadn't been sweaty, that breeze would have just passed by as a lukewarm wind. It turns out the coolness wasn't on the side of the wind, but on my side.

The calendar is probably just like that. Even if you're told that autumn starts today, the scenery outside doesn't change by a millimeter from yesterday. What changes is that you start looking for it. If you aren't looking, you'll end up not noticing even a single breeze.

By the time I got home, my sweat had dried, and it was just hot again.

In the evening, when I went out to bring in the laundry, I felt like the sun was setting a little earlier. It might just be my imagination. But the very fact that I thought that and looked up at the sky is, I think, the effect of today.

#WhatDayIsToday #Risshu #Maranic #Manga #Essay