Autumn Ramblings

 

There is something about this time of the year.  It is a time when hot Summer nights give way to the crisp coolness of an autumn morning.  As a child, it signified beginnings to me.  It was the beginning of a new school year.  It meant the smell of crayons, and untouched spiral bound notebooks.  It was represented by Trapper Keepers and backpacks, and the minute by minute scheduling of an OCD child who loved the safety and the dependable  routine of the school year. This time of year was a new opportunity to learn, and to grow.  Perhaps I would make new friends, or master a new language, or finally understand algebra.  Autumn was filled with sheer possibility, and I loved everything  about it, because of that fact.

In Colorado, where I spent much of my youth, Autumn is a mix of colorful, falling leaves, and the cold, icy snowfall of Winter.  Winter and Fall are somehow mixed into one glorious season of harsh beauty.  It is piles of red and yellowed leaves being blown across the streets by snowy winds.  It is heavy, wet snow breaking the branches off of the semi bare trees.  Funny though, how when we think of Colorado in the last months of the year, we do not think of the slushy, dirty snow being thrown from tire to windshield as we make our way to our destinations.  We think instead, of the beautiful, untouched snowfall, blanketing us safely in our warm homes.  It awakens memories of snowmen, sledding and homemade hot chocolate in our childhood memories.

As an adult, this time of year brings with it a certainty that I was destined to be the mother of sons. I think of the countless evenings spent under the Friday Night Lights of a high school football field.  Watching and applauding as my sons charged through a line of young men, laying them down in the battle over an oblong ball.  The cheers of adolescents chanting for an obscure mascot that championed their cause.  The marching band playing their weekly testament to J.Geils Band by means of a Horn section  screaming out the notes of Angel is the Centerfold.  The deep throaty yells of fathers and mothers alike calling for the conqueror in their child to be present in the moment and to all but flatten his opponent.  These were the calls of testosterone in the landscape.  Our sons were called to the field and there, they became the barbarians much like their forefathers.  Instead of hunting and fighting territorial wars, they battled one another down 100 yards of landscaped grass, marked off by white chalk lines.   

These events awakened something inside of the parent in me.  During these moments, my need to nurture hibernated in the stands, and I stood in pride with the other barbaric parents, calling for my sons, to do what seemed to come naturally to them.  Somehow, in the grittiness of these high school games, I first recognized that my sons would not need me to take care of them for very long.  In retrospect, I feel that if I had daughters, I would not have learned this as soon as I did. Any mother knows, it is hard to let go of the babies we raise.  They get to a certain point where they may not need our support in most areas of life, but still we hold on, trying to have influence on the one small area of life that they allow us in.   Somehow, Friday Night home games taught me that I was destined to be the mother of sons, but it also taught me how to allow my sons to become adults, just  outside of my reach. 

It is interesting to me that people refer to those later in their life as being in the “Autumn” of life.  I understand why.  Where Spring gives way to new life, Autumn, is the winding down of the life cycle.  It is the time that animals forage, and build up their stores to make it through the long hard winter.  But to me, Autumn has always somehow brought everyone closer to home and the safety and warmth that home created for us.  It is Big pots of stick to your bones stews and fires in the fireplace.  It is family gatherings and time with those we value the most.  But it is also the beginning.  It is the start of a new school year. It is a time of abundance as the harvest is brought in.  It is a time of strengthening, and a time of growth as we take those First day of school pictures to compare year over year.  For me, it is a time that I will cherish each year as I remember all of the new beginnings  and firsts or my sons.   The Halloween costumes, and  adventures that the cooler months brought with them. The lessons that my sons taught me about myself, and who I am as a woman, and as a mother.   I cannot wait to see what the next generation has to teach me about myself as a grandmother. I feel like even at the age of 47 I am 1^st and 10, with 60 minutes of play left for me to learn.