Even the leaves that have gathered at the base of the trees have left a carpet blazing with color, which proves irresistible to young kids and dogs as a place to romp and play.
After a late breakfast with a friend, helping him learn his way around his new iPhone, I came home, did some laundry, finished the spit and polish on tomorrow's sermon and then took a long walk.
I was trying to remember this day, all those many years ago, when my first daughter was born. My most vivid memory, other than that of her actual birth, was the way everything seemed to be ablaze with color.
It was a new day, the beginning of a new life as a new mother who had been a wife for exactly nine months to the day. I felt as overwhelmed by a mixture of joy and anxiety as the overwhelming colors of the day.
I felt strangely, fully alive.
I distinctly remembered that feeling as I walked among the Autumn leaves in the brilliant sun this afternoon. My grief and rising anxiety, almost five years after her death, felt as overwhelming as the joy and anxiety I experienced the day she was born.
I felt strangely, fully alive.
Funny how things come full circle - how the seasons come full circle, reflecting the beginnings and endings of life.
The joy and the sadness. The hope and the loss. The laughter and the tears.
More than any other Season in the four seasons we are blessed to enjoy in this part of God's glorious creation, nothing brings this home for me as much as Autumn.
Must be something in those blazing, fallen leaves that makes me feel strangely, fully alive.
2 comments:
Living in a "college town," I often think how "Fall is spring." Fall on a college campus is a beginning. Spring is fall--school comes to an end, and they go off into the world.
I really like the interplay of that, because it prevents me from being too bittersweet about fall!
i am thinking about you, and praying for you, elizabeth... a day late, but praying back into time that you might feel the peace of God even in your grief.
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