autumn

here i am again. times passes all too quickly while we blink. this is my favorite time of year. this is when the lonely scarves make their way back to kiss the necks of their sun-tanned lovers. this is a time to sit and sip warm coffee in the crisp, afternoon breeze. this is a time to reflect on the beauty of life as auburn leaves light up the sky. this is autumn and it's beautiful. even the word "autumn" has an enchanting sound to it. i think one day when i die beneath the changing leaves with my scarf tied tightly around my neck, i will tell them to write "autumn" on my tombstone. not because it has some deep, philosophical meaning or because i want to inspire thought, simply because it is beautiful. but i didn't always have such an intimate relationship with autumn. in fact i used to call her "fall." those were the days i was i love with her care-free sister, "summer." fall was the reason i attempted so desperately to build a time machine out of cardboard boxes and hulla-hoops in my backyard when i was younger. i used to wish that i could rip fall right out of the calendar. fall meant no more sunny days spent by the pool. fall meant school, homework, and exams. fall meant the end of my social life. fall was always around the corner, it was always tucked away in the back of our minds while we pretended to ignore her. fall was the inevitable. and worst of all, fall was change. it was trying to cope with the ever-changing social ladder that you never wanted to find yourself at the bottom of. it was memorizing hundreds of seemingly useless facts and dates on columbus sailing ocean blue's and 1492's. it meant faded tans and long sleeves. it meant brown bag lunches and soggy sandwiches. it meant growing up, and dare i say, "maturing." maturity, a word made up by adults to justify their boring lives. but one fateful day in fall, everything changed, like things always do. it was one of those overcast days that dares you to sleep the whole day away, but instead i was off to school so i wouldn't find myself working at McDonalds one day, according to my mom. although i would rather have been almost anywhere that there, it was usually easy enough to fake education. just sit there quietly with your eyes focused on a spot just above the teacher's head while you day dream about all of summer's simplicity and the adventures you will have when your mistress returns. but this day was different. i trudged through the halls spilling melancholy with every step, just as i always did after clocking in for another shift. i sat down in some distant seat, if it wasn't in the back row i broke out my tape measure and made sure it was no less than one thousand miles from the front. if i could read the writing on the board without binoculars i was too close. but today, instead of focusing on that faithful little spot right above the Math teacher's head, my eyes drifted to the window. and instead of my mind flirting with the past and my future, my thoughts were trapped in the present, here and now. while the teacher carried on about complex fractions and radical numbers i began to panic inside. what was happening? this is not my routine and this is not comfortable. a leaf flickering in the breeze caught my eye. i tried to tell myself that it wasn't worth my time but the way it danced there on that branch captured my complete attention. soon i felt the cool breeze come through the window and it whispered to me and told me her name. "i am autumn," she said, "and i am not here to hurt you, only to open your eyes." since that day autumn has won my heart with her love. and here is it in her familiar embrace once again. i see a golden leaf clinging desperately to the limb ti will soon no longer know as home. it holds on for dear life, terrified of what's next. scared of leaving the familiar and entering into the unknown. scared that it's not ready for what lies ahead, unsure of itself. "am i ready?" "what am i meant for?" "what if i'm not good enough?" it asks. then i watch as it receives a gentle nudge and it flutters gracefully to my feet. i look at it and i see beauty. i see courage and purpose. it reminds me how precious life is, just like it will remind countless others with open eyes, and maybe even a few still lost in summer's absence. so maybe "autumn" has a little more poetic value than i'm willing to admit. sometimes i guess we find hope where we least expect it to show up.