Fallen

This year, our trees didn't get their chance to slowly take a vibrant turn before gradually falling to the approaching winter. It has been unseasonably rainy and frigid. Most trees in my neighborhood didn't turn at all. It got cold so suddenly, they froze and fell instead. Green and dead on the ground in huge piles, overnight. Some of them have managed to hold onto their leaves- but they're dark green-brown and ugly still the same.

I love Autumn. I anticipate it every year. It's beauty always brings out my introspective, nature-loving side. Seeing such a sudden, brutal interruption to the natural rhythm of the seasons has made me so, well, melancholy, for use of a dramatic-sounding, and perfectly-fitting word.

It was just awful.

To be honest, it has felt very, very, very faintly of what it is like to lose someone early, to lose someone unexpectedly. An abrupt interruption to the way we know it is supposed to be. To see vibrant life stopped short, frozen and dead when there was still so much beauty for it to reveal. It's just overwhelmingly wrong.

And so this Fall has left me thinking and brooding over this fallen world. So often, our lives are stopped short, our expectations are broken, our hopes are shattered. Things here so often do not go smoothly, and beautifully pass just as we believe they should. Beautiful lives are stopped suddenly. Growing, vibrant relationships end abruptly. We can't foresee it, but we can know certainly that very little is certain, though we so very badly want guarantees, though we so very badly want control. But even when life rages an ice storm, there is still unexpected beauty, and hope, and assurance that it will pass.

And as for me, and my fallen Fall, there is still so much beauty, absolutely everywhere, and there are so many treasures to find, that I can't help but be turned hopeful. The loss of Autumn as I wanted it has caused my eyes to sharpen, and see what else there is, besides the glorious warm-cool days and beautiful leaves I was hoping for. It's pushing me to help my children see it, too, as we bundle up ridiculously for October to explore outdoors. And it's made me appreciate my warm, safe home, my sweet cuddly family, and my hot pumpkin soup and warm bread all the more.

So I am hopeful. And I know that even seasons of unexpected pain and loss can be beautiful. And I'm thankful.