Change of Season

Autumn is by far my favorite time of year. (At least until Spring arrives after the long Winter.) For me Fall always seems like the beginning of the year. Perhaps because my birthday is soon, and certainly because the school year is indelibly burned into my consciousness, it always brings starting over, beginning new endeavors, perhaps even a minute burst of energy in my otherwise generally energy-less life.

 

I know that Autumn Equinox will be on us soon, a time of Balance, when the world is poised to tip towards darkness, days growing shorter, light fading faster, night coming sooner, cold drawing nearer, yet still I love the season. For pagans, it is the celebration of Mabon, the time of the second harvest, when vegetables like pumpkins, potatoes, onions and other winter staples are ripe for harvest, and we celebrate a time of plenty, before the dimming of the light.

 

Rene and I chose to have our Ceremony of Commitment on the Autumn Equinox, a fitting time for two late middle aged women to take each other on as partners in life, we thought. Ours is not a spring-time union, but one meant to warm us through the autumns and winters of our lives. (I plan to be a thorough Crone before I die, and Rene says, I don’t get the Crone thing, but that’s a whole other entry)

 

My birthday is September 11th, another day that will live in infamy, and I deliberately choose to celebrate it anyway. To do any differently would be to give up a bit of my self to the terrorists, and I refuse to do so. The day, however, is forever marked by the memory of the towers going down, and the terrible loss of life. Somethings are too hard to understand.

 

So Autumn brings melancholy with her as she settles in, but she also brings chrysanthemums in Mabon colors- reds and oranges and golds and russets – and the riot of fall colors which creep slowly down New England from Maine, arriving in full glory towards the end of October with colors which outshine the mums   I realized how atypical a Virgo I am one year while sitting on the ground, drunk with the pleasure of being at one with the litter of leaves around me; I seem to thrive in chaos, not neatness.

 

It is the season to sit in the hot tub and let the wind blow swirls of leaves off the trees, a time to wear socks with my birkenstocks, to wear jackets on my daily hobbles, to have fires in the fireplace, and sleep with the windows open, under quilts. And this year I will actually have a quilt!

 

I know that it will also be a season of continued doctors’ appointments, pain meds, and struggle with body and spirit, but a new season brings a breath of hope for continued change. I’ll take it.

 

Blessings, Margo

 

picture from:

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