New blessings

 

Trees are beginning to feel a little lighter. Leaves are changing their costumes, putting their make-up on, getting dressed to leave their old lives, making place for the new to take shape. 

I try to add a spring in my step, crunching the dried leaves resting on the sidewalk. Patches of orange and green leaves, specks of yellow on a few others, deep reds peeping from the fresh greens are a welcoming sight for me. I am amazed at the way in which fall walks in year after year, accompanied by a quiet grace, making for gentle celebrations.

There is a common thought that crosses my mind at the same time every year. Have I changed? What parts of me have I let go, fall away like the dried leaves that I just stomped upon? Where are my branches leading me? How much longer can I hold on to the green leaves? Am I prettier when I change color?

This year is astonishingly different. The virus has changed nearly everything. It has taken away so much from us, including loved ones, jobs and the joy of fearlessly meeting people. Struggling to cope with the pandemic has made me imagine the beginning of fall more than once in the same year. Initially I felt like the dead leaves, aimless and lifeless. As the months passed, I found myself wanting to shake off the withered leaves and allow little tints of color to seep in. Coping in ways I had never imagined I could, I felt like the autumn sun, the deep green leaves or like the mixed bunch of pink, crimson and bright yellow, with just enough space for a small patch of red.

Today, in the midst of this craziness, there are times when I feel empty like the bare branches of a tree during fall, deprived of meeting people or going places that would make me happier.
On a day when I make a difference in someone’s life in a virtual space, which is my only meeting place, I feel like a tree bearing the most delicious fruit, and on a day when things fall apart even when I try so hard to keep it together, I know that I have to welcome change like the leaves who willingly change their color, before they prepare for their departure from familiar spaces. Like everyone else I want this virus to be gone forever, leaving us alone to carve our own paths of newness and normalcy.

Until then, I watch, observe, learn with purpose, to understand that the splendor of endings is that they are the birthplace of new timelines.

Inspired by Pam Turner’s quote, “When my hands are full, it is not possible to welcome new blessings.”