LONGING . . .

It's crisp outside. So crisp that the toothpaste is starting to become less goopy, the face cream starting to become a tad more difficult to spread. Yup, it's that time of year again -- the season that I spend all year looking forward to, but when it arrives, makes me sad, nostalgic, heart-moved. Autumn, my favorite time of year, mostly because -- I think -- it makes me slightly morose. Things "change" in the spring too, but somehow, it's just not the same. In the fall, it seems that things are dying, going away, and even though I know that those things will rejuvenate and return and grow again, the sadness still hovers right over my heart, sometimes poking in with sharp needle pricks now and again.

'Tis appropriate then, I suppose, that this season I have lost something immensely important to me. This part of my heart has gone away for a while, a short while I hope, and just for a season. I know my heart will regrow, rejuvenate, and the things that were lost will return to me, perhaps in a different form or shape, or with different essences, in due time. But that knowledge and even confidence does not prevent the pin-pricks.

It's the time of year when I start looking back at all the things that have come and passed. The walks strolled, the food shared, the nights spent in laughter and closeness. It's the time of year when I let my stare linger distractedly at the streets traversed, the horizon gazed upon, even the couch upon which many truths were given and taken. The season and month when nothing is new, and instead, everything is a reminder of things past. September ... autumn ... such an appropriate time.

God really knew what He was doing when He created the northeast and changing seasons. He really knew what He was doing when he formed trees with leaves that changed colours, winds that turned from hot and humid to cool and more than just a little bit refreshing. He really had the right idea in mind when He decided that the days would be shorter and darkness would reign just a touch longer each day, until He ordained the opposite. He truly understood the seasons of a human heart as well, knowing when things would have to pass, when things would return, how things would die and grow, how hearts would be broken and mended and perfected. The correlation ... I'm so sorry that this experience is limited to such a small portion of the planet. As melancholy and even wrenching as it might be for me, this season, my season, is so hopeful, because I know that as ever, preservation occurs in the winter, warmth is built under the cover of night and flannel, and a fragile but perfect newness is forged in the thaw of spring.

I feel now -- foolishly, I know -- that spring could not come fast enough. But in the deep recesses of my mind and heart, I recognize and accept that the in-between months are needed. Bulbs need to root. Animals need to sleep. Trees need to shed. People need to rest and warm up snuggled near loved ones. And I ... I need these months to grow, heal, draw nearer to Him who sustains me through the highest of ups and the deepest of downs, through the madness of summer months, and yes, especially through the dusk of winter. The melancholy and nostalgia are temporary. Eventually, I know, these things will turn away from pin-pricks and towards unqualified joy.