The dark

Its Fall again. Almost winter when you look at it actually. Leaves are coming off the trees, its rainy and the daylight hours are getting shorter and shorter. Especially now that the clock has been rolled back. I can actually now leave for work in the dark and return home in the dark. If it wasn't for the few windows in my office building and a walk at lunch the only daylight I would be experiencing on weekdays for the next four or five months is the ten seconds or so as the subway goes over the Viaduct in the morning.

Yep its dark and getting darker. Soon that lack of Vitamin D from the sun will kick in and a brother may even start copping an attitude or getting depressed as he struggles through the cold of January and February. Something to look forward to I guess.

But that's Fall for ya. No getting past it so you just accept it and move on.

However I've realized from observation that there is another part of the dark that pops up in the fall.

Its the dress habits of people.

From my cursory breakdown I'd say 85% of all Fall and Winter jackets are black with another 14.99 percent being some combination of brown, dark brown or dark blue. Only occasionally does one see a tan jacket or a bit of red here and there. I never really paid much attention to it before but now that I've noticed its depressing.

I think it started when I saw someone wearing a tan jacket on the subway last week and noticed how much they stood out in that environment. "One of these things is not like the other, one of these things is not the same". It must feel like you're a Zebra surrounded by a pack of hungry lions. Its scary.

I've got one jacket that's not in the 99.99% of blacks, browns, and dark blues and when I wear it I feel like a sore thumb cause I can let my eyes wonder down a packed evening subway car and maybe of the 80 to 100 persons on the car only see one other person not wearing dark colors.

Oh man. Ok so I realize that dark colors assist the storage of body heat which is necessary in this season and I realize that this is Canada not the Caribbean so you don't even see that many vibrant colors in the warm periods, and I realize that dark colors hide the smudges and dust from all the dirt and grime and dirty snow and all that stuff we eventually get in these seasons but still is a little color variation too much to ask?

I aint asking nuhbody to wear green ad orange fluorescent polka dots or nuttin so. All I'm saying is that the dark and lack of warmth is amplified by the dark colored jackets with the sullen faces popping out at their top. It starts to get a bit too much as Winter wears on.