When up in the Catskills, we ate every morning at "Bread & Breakfast," an impossibly cute train-car-turned-diner, where hunters & bikers mingled with locals & tourists and we all stuffed our faces with pancakes and homefries and coffee. In short: a little slice of heaven.
One morning, as we sat waiting for breakfast to be brought to the table, we gazed out a window across the train tracks, to a picturesque white house perched on a picturesque hill. As we watched, yellow leaves rained down, swirling and blanketing the hill as if on cue.
My friend T. remarked, "You guys - autumn is happening. It is happening right now."
* * *
Autumn is the season my heart waits for, all year long. But seasons are slippery and hard to grasp, and life never slows down exactly when you want it to. Though I lie in wait for this season, I always seem to miss it somehow.
I am the coyote and autumn is my road-runner: I see it coming in the distance, I make elaborate plans for it, but in the end? It speeds by every time, leaving a trail of leaves to let me know it passed through.
Not this year, I thought. I can't make autumn slow down, but I can make me slow down. I will slow down and notice autumn, because it is happening right now.
* * *
I spend 45+ daylight hours a week in a beige cubicle that is climate-controlled and season-less. It is hard to notice autumn happening, from inside a cubicle. So the past few weekends, I have made myself stop - stop the errands and the cleaning and the running around. I've forced myself to put down the to-do list and pick up my camera and go for a walk in the park. Because autumn is happening - it is happening right now.
And here are some of the haps:
More to come...
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