With autumn comes stress

By Cathy Lynn Grossman, USA TODAY

Brace yourself. September just rolled in, and it may be the most stressful month of the year.

Unlike December, with its infamous holiday blues, this is a month with all the pressure but none of the parties and presents. September is the evil twin of spring fever. In May, we shed the burdens donned in autumn.

Signs of September's stress:

• For workers. The boss is back, full of great ideas — for you to do. The budgetary year is closing for many companies and the federal government as well, a relentless march to the fiscal year's finale in an iffy economy.

  "September is crazy. No one works in August in Washington, when all the day-care programs and camps are closed. Everyone has to take vacation then, so we have to cram two months' work into September, close out the books, spend the leftover funds and issue all the oversight reports," says Terry Salus, an attorney with the Government Services Administration.

• For business travelers. Hang a calendar and start filling in the dates. "Associations tend to hold meetings all year round, but businesses crank up in the fall," says Julie Barker, editor of Successful Meetings magazine. Although spring is busiest, "September starts the fall season, major months for corporate meetings."
• For investors. Run for cover. Finance experts have long noted that Mondays and cloudy days drizzle on the stock market. September, says Gibbons Burke, editor of www.market history.com, "is like a month of Mondays."

  "We have 105 years of data for the Dow, going back to June of 1896, when it was launched. September is the only month where the average return is negative."

  It's a blight on the S&P 500, with an average return of -1.14% since 1928. October may be the dark cloud over the Nasdaq composite, but September is right on its tail, Burke says.

• For families. Changes abound. School kicks off. (You did finish that summer book list, right?) Car pools, the odious necessity of suburban parenthood, must be rejiggered. Your kids try out for teams. Outside of Lake Wobegon, most do not land starting spots. "Seventy percent of 18-year-olds start college or university this fall, the season of transition," says time expert Geoffrey Godbey, professor of leisure studies at Penn State University.

The woes of winter darkness are well documented. But the impact of September and the autumn equinox, when the days grow shorter "and you know what's coming," is nothing to blink at, Godbey says.

"We have to give up those customized days of summer and return to work-centered living. At the same time, even our leisure becomes more regimented, more highly ordered. Suddenly, even your weekends are more structured. College ball and the NFL kick off, and there goes the weekend for millions of men and women."

The national mood seems to shift with the wind as well, Godbey says.

"There's no news in August other than senators and sex or 18 things to do with zucchini. In September, Congress is in session. The Chinese have AIDS. We don't have a big budget surplus.

"We're getting serious now."