My Favorite Spot of Time

You wonder how these things begin. Well, this begins with a glen. It begins with a season which for want of a better word we might as well call September. 

It begins with a forest where woodchucks woo and leaves wax green and vines entwine like lovers. Try to see it. Not with your eyes for they are wise, but see it with your ears: the cool green breathing of the leaves. And hear it with the inside of your hand: the soundless sound of shadows flicking light.
Celebrate sensation! Recall that secret place, you’ve been there, you remember. That special place where once, just once, in your crowded sunlit lifetime you hid away in the shadows from the tyranny of time. That spot beside the clover where someone’s hand held your hand and love was sweeter than the berries, or the honey, or the stinging taste of mint.
-The Fantasticks

Autumn is a wonderful time of year. I used to say summer was my favorite because I could play outside and get tan, but that’s not really a love of the season, just a love of the activities. Since coming to college especially, I’ve realized what autumn means to me. For some unknown reason, I experience typically “spring” emotions and ideas in autumn: romance, rebirth, and hope.

Romance is always the first to come up in the fall. As soon as the air turns chilly in the mornings, a mounting excitement blossoms. It grows stronger each day until that day when the evenings too are chilly. And then the excitement becomes a wish: I wish to wander in the chilly evening with someone special. It doesn’t matter if I have a specific someone in mind – no, that is unimportant. What matters is that autumn evenings are perfect for long walks. Feel the rustling of the leaves, taste the chill in the air, breathe in the exhilaration of walking at night.

Rebirth may actually show itself in the spring, but autumn is even more so a time of new beginnings. The school year, for one thing, begins in the fall. But more important, now is when the full splendor of the leaves is seen. This is the culmination of their life here – once this is done, they leave and make way for the new growth. Seeds will fall now that make spring possible. So much potential is seen in the fall. This is when the patterns are created that will lead to our spring.

Associated with this cleaning of the slate that autumn brings is the feeling of hope I get. No matter how bad the year was, no matter the relationships formed or lost, no matter what I feel I messed up on, and no matter what I planned on doing, autumn is when I feel most hopeful to improve. The good things from the past year will either stick or disappear throughout the autumn. The bad things can fall with the leaves and I can forget them.

This hope is the most powerful feeling autumn brings me. Over the past few days as autumn as crept down from the mountains to the valley floor, I have reconsidered my career, dedicated myself to new goals, and discovered new faith within myself. I have the hope that my career plans will work out, no matter how unsure I feel today. I have hope that with the good start I’ve made on my goals that I can progress and fulfill them. And I have hope that my new faith will make me a better child of God and bring me closer to His presence.