Fall

The seasons are starting to change here in Arizona. It's a subtle thing here. We don't get the same turn of the leaves or drastic change in the weather. Half the time the kids on Halloween are out in their shirt sleeves, no warm clothing in sight.

Fall is my favorite time of year. I look forward to it with all the ravenous enthusiasm of a person who hates the heat. Fall means that I can start spending more time outside, I can plant the winter garden, and I can start planning for the holidays, which always means Family.

Family is everything.

I know that, symbolically, fall is the time of year when everything ripens and prepares for the season of death, but isn't there a richness in getting to that point in life? I'm not there yet, but I've witnessed many people in the Falls of their lives who seem freed to become who they always should have been.

It's a season of change-- of looking forward to the still time and the rebirth to come-- a time of hearth and home and knitting by the fire. A time of homemade marshmallows and copious amounts of hot chocolate.

There is a richness and decadence in these last moments.