I still have enough Yankee in me that I expect that by the time we reach Sukkot it should feel like fall. It has been looking like fall. To the extent that the leaves fall and/or turn colors down here they have started to do that. The light in the afternoon is the right deep gold. But let’s face it, it has been too hot.

Just as Sukkot was coming in, however, the weather started to break. This morning it is deliciously cool and while the expected high is not fallish by an ex-Michiganders standards, I will take it.

It was pleasant last night too as we gathered to decorate the sukkah. We davened in the sukkah by candlelight. It was lovely.

Sukkot, of course, is one of the chagim--the three ancient pilgrimage festivals. These days the pilgrimage is largely symbolic. We move from the comfort and security of our homes to the purposely flimsy shelter we have erected in the “wilderness.” In physical space our pilgrimage amounted to a few steps from the social hall to the sukkah, but still it was wilderness in that it was an environment largely out of our control. The temperature, the breeze, the bugs (blessedly few) were not subject to any adjustment to suit our needs or desires. Gathered close together in the candlelight, I felt connected to our tribal ancestors and got a taste of how intensely they must have experienced this time of year.

By the time I got home the Sukkot moon was bright in the sky. I looked at it for a while through the sugarcane schach of my sukkah. While I can look at my calendar and know the date, this sight is the more ancient and truer sign that the zman simchateinu, the season of our rejoicing, has come.