A cold chill has returned to the morning air, making coffee on the back deck a little less enjoyable. The squirrel and blue jay that I spend time with each morning seem a little more focused on the task of gathering and preparing for winter then on entertaining me with their playfulness. The sun seems less warm and I feel within me a need to start getting things ready for the coming rain and snow.
This has been a different kind of summer. While we got away we didn’t get to relax. While we had plenty of fun together I am not sure it was enjoyable. There were parties for Darla’s graduation, Katee,s graduation, birthdays, and weddings. It was definitely a summer of celebration. Trips to Texas and Seattle, allowed us to get away. There was even a brief pause for our Anniversary. But it was also a summer in which I sensed the passing of time more than ever before. Who doesn’t have a child get married and not realize that things are changing? With all the activity I couldn’t help but think that each task completed, each day finished, each party and celebration enjoyed, was somehow bringing us closer to the beginning of a change I have tried to ignore. Our family will be changing from now on. Rather than raising kids, we will be moving into the stage of launching them on their own course. We will watch them face the challenges that we had to learn to navigate,. And, I won’t be able to protect and guide like I have done to this point. In many ways I feel my role is coming to an end, and I am not sure what place I will have in their lives in the future. In many ways with Derek and Rachel’s wedding I now feel old. I now feel the aches and pains more than ever when painting the house, working in the yard, fixing the hot tub or carrying a keg from the car to the patio. the 46th birthday and 26th Anniversary of this summer only serve to remind me that I am not who I once was. I am older, heavier, slower, and a little more contemplative than i was at 20,30 or even 40.
As the season changes from summer to fall, I realize my life is changing as well. I love summer, and I have loved my youth. Yet I am anticipating the changing of leaves, the Holiday gatherings, the possibility of snow. There are many thing to start getting excited about in my changing life. What will wisdom and experience bring in the new season, the freedom and extra time. I still have more weddings, more graduations, amore kids to launch and more years to get older. There is plenty more dancing on the back deck, kegs to carry, and houses to paint. This is just a change of seasons and soon it will be summer again. May you have an awesome fall.
