Ours is connected to our house like an addition — three walls of flimsy plywood on the deck, the sliding side door of our home serving as the fourth. We thatch wooden poles across the top and decorate them with branches and leaves, in keeping with the tradition that you must be able to see the sky and the stars when in the sukkah. Only last year, my 20th living in this house and in this town, did I realize what the real difference was, as we were putting up our sukkah and had to go to great lengths to ensure our opaque pieces of plywood could withstand the rattling wind.

In that moment I realized that I always instinctively knew Sukkot was near because of these annual winds — the breeze that invariably picks up in early autumn, carrying in the brisk air and the smell of dying leaves and faintly-burning firewood. These fall zephyrs are the one thing that still make me feel somewhat connected to the land where I live, that for once I do not have to drive north toward the mountains or south toward the ocean to feel as though I understand something of the natural details of the world around me.

To me, that is what Sukkot is about. It’s not only a religious holiday but also a seasonal one that asks us to remember a time when understanding the intricacies of the living world around us was not only crucial to a successful harvest season, but a matter of survival. I guess it’s fitting that for me the arrival of Sukkot has always been announced by the feeling that autumn is here — but lately, in a world where summers are growing longer, I can’t help but be reminded that it might not last.

Now, so many of us are lucky to sleep with solid roofs over our heads rather than thatched ones. We buy our food from expansive supermarkets. We live in houses and buildings with walls so tough it is never questioned whether or not they could withstand the autumn winds. We pass our days in the protected enclaves of cities and suburbs that allow us the luxury of forgetting, and of caring, that our very existence is ruled by this land where we live, that if we take too much we will suffer the consequences.

This year’s weather patterns have come in following a summer of heat and furor over the damage caused by such carelessness. Over the burning of an Amazon rainforest, the green beating heart of our planet, that is already suffering record rates of deforestation. Over a warming climate that will cause catastrophic damage to people in places that have less stable roofs and walls as ours, places that world leaders do not seem to care enough about to do something until it will be too late for them, too.