Autumn is a season that I prize for its transience as much as for its splendor.  Were autumn to last as long as summer or winter, it would not be quite as meaningful.  Autumn is also the time when roasting becomes something of a pleasant, warmth-giving activity. 

This summer has been a particularly long and brutal one in downtown Milwaukee, and to fire up a three ton coffee roaster on a 95 degree day is kind of like pouring Tobasco sauce into an open wound.  While the rest of our factory's personnel sat in air conditioned regality at the front of the building, Kim and Beth and I slogged zombielike through endless strings of 90-100 degree days, roasting, blending, bagging, filling orders, and cleaning.  Were it not for five or six floor fans and a very liberal consumption of Mark's iced tea, I don't think we would have made it through with our sanity intact. 

Now however, the tables have begun to turn. 

Every morning this week has been just cold enough to making firing up the roaster a joy rather than a task, and of course hot cups of coffee have also become a bit more precious.  Very soon, the coffee roaster will once again assume its wintertime role as factory furnace and the back end of the Stone Creek Factory will be blessed with abundant heat and the delicious smell of freshly-roasted coffee while the offices up front will be a dark cavern of drafts, chilliness, and everpresent sweaters.  But until winter is ushered in, and I am not in any hurry for that to happen, autumn offers us all a bit of balance, and a generous helping of peace and slowness. 

"This road--
  No one goes down it,
  Autumn evening."

Basho (1644-1694)