The other day a friend of mine posted on Facebook that she knows Fall is coming when she dons a sweatshirt and pulls out the hot chocolate. Wha? It's 900 degrees here still. Where is she living?
Oh yeah. Alaska.
But it got me thinking. Or feeling, rather. I heart Fall. It's my favorite time of year. The air starts crisping up, leaves change, apples beg to cinnamon themselves into applesauce, and the mountains around here turn scarlet. Football starts and family rooms fill up with cheers and groans and hotdogs. But the best part of all? Sweaters come out of boxes, along with decorations for the most cozy, memory-inducing holidays on our calendar.
If I were in charge of my own planet, the seasons would line up like this: Fall – 6 months. Winter – 1 month (December). Spring – 4 months (but only early spring when mornings are still cool, breezes blow, and everything is just starting to peep up from the ground. Not that narsty late spring that's really summer and everything lies around moaning from the encroaching heat). And finally, Summer – 1 month. Maybe.
(And since we're discussing it, if I were in charge of my own planet chocolate would be dietetic, gestation would last two weeks then your kid would walk out of your belly button with a Master's degree, pink-lemon-sour shave ice would cure all diseases, and Hollywood would have to run their screenplays by me first. I really should have my own planet.)
But the most jarring thing when I read my friend's little status? My kids will be going back to school next week. How. did that. happen.? Seriously. Time is on hyperspeed. Because it was just last week that we were sitting down figuring out who was going on which choir tour and to which camp, and what jobs were going to be applied for, and realizing that the kid abroad had already been gone for four months. And now it's been six. And omigosh, I still have to buy school supplies and pay all the fees and everyone needs shoes because they've all grown a foot. In height, not appendages. Plus, it's time once again for my annual Sign-up-for-enough-little-helpful-things-at-the-school-that-I-won't-get-nabbed-for-room-mother-because-I-stink-like-cabbage-at-that-job.
In short, Fall makes me realize that I have a lot to be grateful for. And its rapidity of arrival tells me I'd better not waste any time enjoying it all. Enjoying them all. Or they'll be gone, and I'll just be standing on a ladder with orange and black crepe paper hanging from me wondering where the party went.
Yay for Fall! I'm going to start living it now.
Candy corn?
I know! It's crazy! This summer was – WHOOSH! – gone. We start school just after Labor Day and I'm soooo glad we decided to wait until then this year because normally we start at the end of August and I'm Just Not Ready. Homeschooling is flexible that way and it's saving my sanity this year. Next year I want a real summer type vacation where I'm not running and running and running from one thing to another praying that I can Get It All Done. My multi tasking skills have been well exercised this summer, but it would be nice to single task for a summer.