The Big Fall Shows

Here it is, the first day of Autumn, 2009. Our fantastic late fall weather has shifted in the last twenty-four hours and and today it is cool, overcast, still. I could build a fire in the fireplace today and it wouldn't seem out of place.

When I'm lazy I pull out my laptop and browse through things, never quite landing a serious eye on anything, catching words only briefly, lingering over pretty pictures. It's like the channel surfing of the nineties: flip, flip, flip, pause--nah, flip, flip . Sometimes I flip through the Etsy website; sometimes I flip through GearJunkie. This week I've been flipping through fall fashion pictures from all the big shows. You'd think I'd attend to my own fashion more the way I'm drawn to those fashion shots. But they are simply eye-candy, for the moment. And always, I'm a little like my German/Indian grandmother, finding fault first before I praise the entirety. The big shows are always over the top and for a sensible Midwest woman, there is always something to fault. Big gory eye makeup, weird flaps and zippers, and this year, superbly clunky shoes, gladiator-style with lifts and wraps and chunks. Gladiator mid-ankle boots, chunk bootlets, strapped, bootie stilletos. You just know that if you wore any one of them everyone on the bus would stare at you.

It's amusing how just when I'm ready to pull out my fall sweaters and wool pants, I'm catching the spring looks on the runway. In fall, they show spring. In spring, they show fall.

We do somewhat the same in the book world. It gives the buyers of this world a chance to work ahead of the consumer. This week we're working on our spring catalog; all book covers need to be done by October 15. But our fall show, the midwest regional trade show, showcases our current fall books; the publishing world is a lot more "just in time." The books are out--and came out as early as August--but this is the time we handsell the books to our trade accounts, our independent bookstore partners throughout the five-state area. We bring in authors, give away books, talk up promotional plans for the holiday season, and take orders. Pre-orders for this season look stronger for our frontlist than they did last season, despite all the conservative practices of the entire industry this year. Blue is the new black, I hear. But really, frugality is the new black. Everyone wants to get out of the red and into the black.

The big fall shows are happening everywhere, some just in time and some pushing the season ahead. Push-push. College campuses are revved up with the "prospie" tours, hoping to sell their best features to the high school juniors and seniors touring their top five choices. Even health care has its push-push, its high-selling season. November is typically open enrollment for managed health care. And just as soon as we pull off Halloween, the Christmas push-push will be on full steam ahead.

Despite all the big fall shows, the thing I tend to like about fall is that by nature it signals a slowing down, at least for a city girl like me (that is, I haven't crops to pull in, produce to put up). It might last only a few weeks, before the holiday hubabub, but the first days of fall are just made for lingering. Poets might say this is the wistfulness of fall, where we mourn another summer gone by. But I've always loved the coming of winter, the beauty of things turning and closing down for the night. We talked over drinks on Frost's patio last night and all agreed we have no trouble falling asleep at night. We're tired. We've pushed enough for the day. Clean sheets on soft skin and plump pillows and we're happy as clams. Fall is like the sweet hour before sleep comes on. Ahhh.