Rushing between chores, commitments, appointments and disappointments as we are, living indoors as we do, it’s easy to let the day itself slip by in the background unnoticed. And by “the day”, I mean the transit of the sun and the fall of gentle light in autumn. As I write this, we’ve just enjoyed an autumn that warrants some attention, some appreciation.

Autumn in Victoria is a global sweet spot of weather. You throw on a T-shirt, maybe a windcheater and a beanie while walking the dog in the morning, but you’re still in shorts. The days are pink at both ends, and the air across southern Australia is never so still as it is in autumn. Wind puts everyone on edge, but the epidemic stress caused by wind eases in this season. A still day is comforting, wolves cannot creep up on you on a still day, fires cannot spread, sound carries many kilometres. You can see a dog bark a kilometre down the beach and say to your kid, “Shhh... Listen. I bet a dog barks”, and the bark will arrive on cue and make you seem clairvoyant. That’s autumn, time of atmospheric and acoustic wonders.

The birds seem more urgent, too, louder than they have been for months. So many trees are in bloom, the eucalypts hung with red and pink and yellow blossom, and the lorikeets and honeyeaters are bingeing raucously, putting on condition for the season to come.

In the morning, the water in the bay is as flat as mercury and the air as clear as spirit, allowing Williamstown to creep so close to Port Melbourne, we cock an ear to hear its cappuccino machines gurgle and the spars of its yachts tinkle. Then the day will warm, just enough to draw people into the parks.

It’s a sin to waste autumn sun, profligate, something only a vampire or journalist would do. It’s the time of year for napping outside at lunchtime once the sandwich is eaten. Lie on the grass or sit on a bench and close your eyes. Too bright to nap? The eyelids glowing red? Cover your face with a hanky. The summer sun, brazen enough to be stalking us in broad daylight only yesterday, a bully from whom we had fled, has reformed and become a therapist, a masseuse, a mother, a promise. Lie there and have your dreams lit with hope through a hankie that is aglow with autumn sun.

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It is going though, the sun. It will be scarce from hereon in. One thing about something running out, it usually makes a person appreciate that thing fully and fervently like they never could when there was abundance. So to me it’s a surprise we don’t love the natural world better in this time of its decline.

Autumn is a time for musing on lifespans, on endings, on the light dimming. Forget what the calendar says, autumn is the year’s end. Winter is coming after all, everyone’s metaphor for death. Sadly, autumn means the end of the old folk. Every year comes a day in mid autumn when some householder sets them going, a wiry woman usually, with bones close to the surface. She’ll gather her kindling and light her heater and wood smoke will nose through the streets and over the fences into neighbours’ yards, causing the elderly to check the tyre pressure on their caravans and the oil level in their SUVs.

This cold-fingered woman has unwittingly sparked an exodus. Over the next weeks, the seniors will get itchy feet and begin preparations. They’ll come around for arvo tea to farewell the family, give the grandkids a gift, see you in late September, maybe October.