It's That Time Again.

It's late Semptember when it begins, when one feels that first nip of cool weather. Then tree leaves turn red, yellow, orange, brown, oftentimes creating a gloriuosly bright surrounding in which we go about our daily tasks. Even though this is a season of "dying," autumn strikes me as very much alive. The colorful leaves we see every day will soon fall, one by one, to the earth below. The death will have been completed. Until that time, there's a changing, daily show for us, as no tree stays the same. And until this "lying down to rest" is completed, the show will go on.

A phenomenon which is a part of this process for me almost every year is the slight surprise I feel when all the leaves are down. In my busy life, I probably didn't stop to see the kaleidescope of colors, at least as not often as I should have. Then, poof! It's all gone. And we're left with the starkness -- which has its own beauty. But it seems as if one day I'm driving down the street admiring the lovely colors, and the next day I'm looking at bare limbs, limbs being held out to cradle the coming snow.

And soon after, I'll awaken one morning to see the serene beauty brought by the soft, white snow on those stark tree limbs which just a few weeks ago had been blazing with color.