There were many things I meant to write about last month: Portland Fashion Week (disappointing but fun); volunteering at the Humane Society (cute animals); adopting two kittens (love); a day trip out to Hood River to ride the Mt. Hood Railroad (beautiful); turning 30 (not much different than 29 so far)… but October seems to have flashed by with nary a post to show for it.
Now all I can do is look forward. Forward to the last months of 2009 and the new beginnings in 2010, although I have always considered the Fall to be the beginning of my new year. Perhaps it’s because this is when school starts and although I am long removed from the excitement of a new school year, I still consider it the beginning of my personal calendar year.
Perhaps it’s the change in the weather, the darker days, the warmer clothes, the gorgeous rich fall colors, or the Pumpkin Spice lattes at Starbucks. Whatever it is, I look forward to it every year. It renews me in a way that no other season does, and I crave renewing.
The old must be shed for the new to come and what better visual metaphor is there than the changing colors of the fall leaves. I ooh and aah at their rapidly changing beauty, jump in them as they drift into piles on the ground, and smile as they crunch under my feet as I walk , breathing in the crisp clean fall air. I know that all too soon it will be over and the trees will be left bare and vulnerable for a season, but I know that change is brewing under the surface and this is not the end.
Fall reminds me that the only constant is change, and that it can be an incredibly beautiful experience once you know that every end is actually a new beginning.
