When the House Knew What Season It Was

By Mark Morgan,

There was a time when you didn't need your telephone to tell you fall was coming.

The house told you.

When the mornings started getting a little cooler and somebody said, "We better get those storm windows on before it turns cold," you knew summer had just about packed its bags.

Back then, changing seasons sometimes meant changing the house.

Some homes had screens that came out and storm windows that went in. Then when spring finally showed up, you did the whole thing backward.

And somehow, the window you were holding never seemed to belong to the window you were standing in front of.

You'd carry that thing halfway around the house before somebody hollered,

"No, that one's for the bedroom!"

Well, it would've been handy to mention that before I climbed the ladder.

Those old storm windows weren't exactly light, either.

You handled one like you were carrying the Ten Commandments down the mountain.

"Don't drop it!"

Nobody ever had to explain what would happen if you did.

Glass has a way of explaining itself.

Sometimes the windows were marked so you knew where they belonged. Sometimes you just kept trying them until one finally fit.

That was our version of modern technology.

Trial and error.

When spring came, the storm windows came back down and the screens went up.

And that first evening when the windows were opened and a warm breeze came through those screens—that was better than any weather forecast.

You could smell somebody cutting grass.

You could hear a lawn mower three houses down.

Maybe a dog barking somewhere off in the distance.

And if there was supper cooking, that screen didn't keep the smell inside, either.

The whole neighborhood knew somebody was frying something.

Today, most of us don't fool with changing windows every spring and fall. Modern windows are better insulated, easier to use, and certainly more convenient.

I'm not asking for the old ones back.

My back probably isn't asking for them, either.

But I've been thinking about what we lost when so many little seasonal chores disappeared.

Back then, we paid attention.

You noticed when the days got shorter.

You noticed that first cool morning.

You knew when it was time to put things away, button things up, and get ready for what was coming next.

There was an old saying:

"To everything there is a season."

Maybe that's what those old windows were teaching us without anybody realizing it.

Life has seasons, too.

There are times to open things up and let the breeze come through.

There are times to close things up and prepare for a storm.

There are seasons when we're busy raising families, working, and wondering how we'll ever get everything done.

Then one day we look around and wonder how those years went by so quickly.

Maybe that's why those old chores mean more to us now than they did back then.

At the time, changing storm windows was just work.

Today, it's a memory.

And that's the funny thing about life.

Some of the things we couldn't wait to finish are the very things we'd give almost anything to experience one more time.

Not because the old way was easier.

It wasn't.

But because somebody we loved might be standing at the bottom of that ladder again, hollering,

"Be careful with that window!"

And we'd probably holler back,

"I've got it!"

Even if we didn't.

The lesson is simple:

Pay attention to the season you're in.

Because just like those old storm windows, one season comes down and another goes up.

And most of the time, we don't realize how special either one was until we're carrying the memory of it years later.