Old Friends

Ella Fitzgerald is crooning the Jailhouse Blues while I sit at my desk, looking out the window and seeing the most beautiful blue sky and the autumn leaves clinging to the trees in the wind. It is a glorious day. I received a text this morning from my oldest daughter telling me so. She is right.

I got an eight page autobiography today from an old friend. We've recently connected again and I have read and reread this personal account of his life about four times now. I learn something new each time I read it. I think back to when we knew one another and how we went our separate ways and wonder at the universe and what we can afford to one another at this time in our lives. He seems to have done SO MUCH in his life. I can sum up the 90's for myself in one sentence. I attached my life to someone when I was 19 and it is his course that I have followed. Someone who had lived a lifetime already by the time I came along. But these are old feelings I have already put to bed...I can say them and not feel the angst I did five years ago.

I'm at a point in my life where I am consciously surrounding myself with people I actually want to be in my life. This is not something that was important to me in my 20's and even well into my 30's. It is important to me now. I want people who encourage me to be better, bigger, more than; just by being these things themselves. I want to be with people who are always learning and from whom I can learn.

My old friend fits this bill. I remember the quirky kid he was and even then I knew he made my world bigger. I am sorry for not being able to appreciate him more as my teenager self.

15203 Days Old

So after all of that delving into my new feelings about Autumn, I came to an enlightening thought. It's not an idea that has never crossed my mind before, but its an idea that had a fresh new impact on me. Are you ready? It's going to blow you away. Here it is: Time is Linear.

I know, right? Mindblowing. Well, alright, we all know this. BUT...I was thinking how we are set up to believe that time is cyclical. If we don't get it accomplished today, there's always tomorrow. There's always next Monday, next Summer, next month, next year. But the truth is time is linear. We get today only once.

So today I am 15,203 days old. I am going to get the most out of today because I only have once chance to get it right. I am going to listen, learn, laugh. And I am going to grieve a little when it is over because I will never see today again.

Apprehensive of Autumn

This is the first year, in all my forty one years that I can recall being apprehensive of the coming fall. I usually yearn for the cooler weather, the handful of leaves that turn here in east texas, the anticipation of holidays with family. This year is different. I find myself with a catch in my stomach whenever I think about Autumn. My mind does a sharp about face everytime the Autumn occurs to me. I try to ponder it, i try to roll it around to see the root cause for these alien feelings, but my brain will not cooperate.

This morning, while I was doing my speed interval walking, I looked down and there was the most beautiful sweet gum leaf. It is only a half inch tall, but it was perfectly shaped and had brilliant colors of crimson red and Thanksgiving yellow. I picked it up and carried it gingerly between my finger and thumb, by the stem, for the rest of my workout. I now have it taped to the side of my monitor. While I am typing this I look at it and its so beautiful that it breaks my heart and I start to cry. Again, this is not the way I have always celebrated and anticipated Autumn.

So as my mind tries to scatter, and I try to hold it still long enough to piece my feelings together, I come up with this: time is moving forward and I am not ready. I am not ready to let go of the past or the present or the people around me. I no longer welcome you Autumn, I do not want to be reminded of death and leaving, I do not want another year to pass so quickly.