We have abruptly entered my favorite time of year–autumn. Maryland might still get some hot days, but those are likely to be outliers now that we have less sunlight. Nights are down in the fifities or cooler for the foreseeable, which suits me Just Fine.
As reliably as I lose energy and mood in summer, I get it back in the fall, and I’ve pondered why this should be. Maybe I store up enough Vitamin D by the end of summer to feel a little better? Maybe I sleep better in cooler nights. Maybe the length of daylight suits my circadian rhythm, or all of the above.
I also think a significant benefit to summer’s end is greater quiet. At least in my neighborhood, we aren’t mowing grass, bush-hogging, making hay, weed whacking, doing road work (why does this always involve jack hammers?), or blaring truck radios at nearly the rate we do in early summer. I don’t have to keep fans roaring, and if I do turn on a mini-split for some air movement or heat, it’s much quieter than a fan or AC.
I suspect I am particularly sensitive to noise, but too much of it is bad for us. Excessive noise has been linked to hearing loss (no surprise), and it also negatively impacts heart disease, Type II diabetes, sleep disturbances, stress levels, mental health, attention deficits, learning delays, and birth weight. Danish researchers have linked excessive noise to an increased likelihood of dementia, which ought to be enough to make anybody turn down the volume.
Maybe my appetite for quiet is why I’m drawn as an author to rural historical settings: They were quiet. Think of those first moments of a power outage, when you are immediately aware that the lights have gone out. You also notice–albeit fleetingly–that the fridge isn’t humming, the florescent lights aren’t buzzing, the washing machine and dryer are silent, the heater/AC/fans/streaming/playlist are all muzzled too. That’s the world Lord Julian and the Windhams live in. That much quiet.
No wonder those folks could write wonderful poems and stirring declarations and letters we still quote today. They had big, deep quiet to boost their focus and concentration, to calm their hearts, and settle their immune systems. Maybe quiet was one of their super powers, did they but know it. It’s one theory, anyway.
Of course, they also had backward medicine, backward laws, and lacked a lot of truly lovely mod cons, but if I could get me some more good old-fashioned profound quiet, I’d take it.
Is there some aspect of life 200 years ago that you wish we had more of today?
Hello again Grace
200 years ago everyone who could afford to learned and played an instrument. They played for their own and others pleasure. And played together. Musical evenings were not only for the rich, friends and families played together.
The most fun I had playing was with other people. I sing with others but….not the same.
There was fewer easier distractions and more time, seemingly.
I agree with you about the quiet too
Mary
I have heard over and over again, that the ability to make music is one of the BEST inoculations against cognitive decline ever. Music lights up all kinds of areas of the brain at the same time, that’s apparently a good thing. So here’s to all those piano lessons I took, right?
Lots of quiet here, although some wildlife is incredibly noisy. Pheasants anyone?
If we’re wishing, I’d like affordable household help. My grandmother, who couldn’t afford electricity, telephone, indoor plumbing, and never drove, could afford a “hired” girl.
My mom had daily help too. She and Dad were raising seven kids on one salary, but she could have help with household chores.
Men who can dance! And are happily willing to.
Go to Scotland. Go to any ceilidh in Scotland. Men hopping around everywhere.
I’ll go with the quiet also. I actually told my audiologist when she was checking me for my new hearing aids that losing my hearing wouldn’t bother me as much as other senses (such as vision–how would I read?). I also told her that the bad thing about the hearing aids was I could now hear things I hadn’t before (and really didn’t want to) such as ice dropping in the ice maker, keyboard clicks, and the sound of eating inside my head. The other night I woke up and was scared to death because of a weird sound I couldn’t recognize. After a while, I realized it was my partner moving his feet on the sheets in his sleep, and only then was I able to get back to sleep.
My mom would take her hearing aids out at night. Said it was the best sleep she ever enjoyed.
Great question, Grace!
I wish we had more nights where we stayed home and entertained ourselves. Talking, reading aloud, making music, playing small interactive games. Just low pressure hanging out together.
I find it’s hard to get that today unless you’re out camping. Everyone wants to be on their phone, watching a movie, or out drinking. I’d like to slow down and just enjoy each other’s company instead.
One of my siblings belongs to a church that supports the concept of “family home evenings.” The church doesn’t schedule any activities that night, they discourage parishioners from making it a work late night or go out to dinner night. The idea is to stay home and have fun together. Play board games, share a movie, do crafts… but hang out together at home. Even before screens, my family never did this. We ate dinner together most nights, but then it was dishes, homework, chores… bed. That was a missed opportunity to equate family with joy, and I regret that.
Interested to read that you are in Maryland. We lived in DC (and just over the border in nearby Maryland) for 16 years –quite a change from our Canadian home. My favourite escape, especially in the period following 9/11, was to drive out along the Potomac into the Maryland countryside to visit sheep farm studios (avid knitter here). In September, the sound of the crickets in the late afternoon was calming and familiar and a far cry from the sound of military helicopters whirring overhead.
I will have to look around for a sheep to shawl to visit. I am also newly aware of flower farms in the area, and they sound right up my alley.
Fall is the best season. It feels friendly to me, even though people tend to describe it as bleak. But I am really commenting to thank you for Lord Julian — his stories are exactly what I’ve been wanting for a while now. Regency but not exactly romance, mysteries where no one dies (so far, I’m about to start book 3), the main character grows as a person, animals are basically treated well, and people generally treat each other kindly during the course of the story. Thank you!
Thanks for those kind words, Erin. I challenged myself with both Lady Violet and Lord Julian to write non-violent mysteries. So far, it’s working pretty well, but it’s hard to make the stakes high when nobody is getting bumped off. The odd thing is, most mystery writing workshops assume somebody will die in every book… One of the reasons I enjoy Dick Francis’s horse racing mysteries so much is that often, the issue is not murder with them either. Might be attempted murder, but he wrote many a wonderful whodunit without much homicide.
I’m with you with the love of quiet. It helps to wear earplugs around in the summer, the mowing etc. is less intrusive. But the fall is the superior season for many reasons and I plan on enjoying the crisp in the air and the hopeful flourishing of my houseplants just back from the summer on the porch and repotting! I’m going to travel a little bit next month, and I also believe staunchly that autumn is the best, most comfortable, and beautiful time to travel.
I love to get my husband to read aloud, he has a wonderful voice, and playing music together is so fun. Even so when the power goes out, I never think of the low tech fun we could have, but instead panic I won’t have enough light to read. As if not only has the electricity fled but it is instantly a cold, dark, long, and solitary winter night.
My e-reader goes back on the charger every night, and in the back of my mind I’m thinking, “If the power goes out, I know I can read for a few hours…” Because the power does go out, and I DO read for a few hours.
Well, certainly not their dentistry.
I think being closer to animals, particularly horses.
All food being organic. Small farms.
Craftmanship. There was some beautiful woodworking, plastering and art going on back then.
Sailing ships. They are so, so beautiful.
Beautiful long dresses.
Having long visits where you’d basically move in with someone for a month or three.
Larger families, and not feeling guilty about it.
I can probably think of more, but I have to get some sleep. Come to think of it, back then I couldn’t read without eyestrain at night, so I’d probably get to bed earlier!
Again, please leave out my last name on this and my post to the 2 weeks ago question about freakouts.. Thanks a lot. I appreciate it.
Ellen,
You know, I was surprised that most people in the Regency had good teeth. Only those rich enough to dump a lot of sugar into their diets ended up with bad teeth, and the remedy there was opium pain killers plus having teeth pulled. Pretty simple, and the opium was cheap and easy to get.
I think the pace of life from 200 years ago is very attractive. Maybe that’s why my favorite genres are regency and Victorian novels. (There’s also an attraction to time travel novels, but they often go back way more than 200 years!) We spend so much time rushing to and fro today that it seems we have little “down time” to just relax and enjoy the weather, the peace, the companionship of family and friends. Everyone is so busy today. It’s up to us to carve out some quiet time each day, to just sit in the sun on a comfy swing with a loved one. That has become my daily goal! Stay safe. Stay well everyone!
The effort it took to get anywhere back then also seemed to result in some collective destinations (church on Sunday, market on Wednesday, the lending library on Friday because it was only open on Friday) that ensured regular social interaction for a good chunk of the village. Now we run our errands amid a sea of strangers and that makes for a to do list with no leavening of social joy.
I can think of a lot of things that were common 200 years ago, but not so much today. Like community assemblies, dancing, playing musical instruments.
And the quiet!
But the thing I think most relevant to me is recognition of mourning. Yeah, 2 years seems to be about right, because one and a half still isn’t enough.