The Autumn of Life
The season of autumn brings forth many changes. Endless summer days segue into earlier sunsets and darker evenings. Crops, orchards, and gardens are harvested. Leaves change from green to a beautiful array of red, orange, and yellow. My favorite is the tree that is bright green on one half, and resplendent fall color on the other half. One branch squarely in the comfort of summer, and another branch looking forward to the changing future. Another favorite plant is the fireweed. This glorious creation bursts forth in late summer with a towering pink cone, colorful petals growing skyward as the days pass. It is always a wistful day when you first spot the fireweed because they announce the changing of the season. Soon enough, they develop wispy white tufts and the pink flowers give way to empty coiled stems and bright red leaves. Just as both seasons of color in the tree leaves are beautiful in their own way, so too the stages of the fireweed life cycle.
As we approach the autumn of our lives, how many of us look forward to the change? Do we embrace this transition or do we wish to live in a perpetual summer? It seems that much of our current culture wishes for the latter. We want our days and our health and our lives to be endless, like those long summer nights. We want our physiques and our minds to stay forever green and vibrant. Why can’t I continue to do the things I have always done? Hike the peaks that I did just a few years ago? Fit into the same clothes that I did for last year’s vacation? Get as much done with as little sleep and as much energy as I always did? These kinds of questions often come to bear in the setting of a serious injury or chronic illness or a cancer diagnosis. The toll that the disease or its treatment takes on the body can leave many feeling like summer passed into autumn without warning, without enough time to prepare. The realization sets in that leaves never change from red/orange/yellow back to green. At least not in this life.
And so we do what we can to delay the transition. We dress younger. We wear more makeup or have more surgery. We push ourselves to try to do things we always did but now at the distinct risk for injury or disappointment. And when this isn’t enough, we get desperate. Can’t you help me do the things I used to do, be the way I used to be? Why won’t this ache go away? It’s a difficult trap we find ourselves in today. The quest for endless summer in a world of changing seasons.
Especially in the setting of health difficulties but certainly applicable to us all, autumn can bring many blessings if viewed with the mindset that we cannot stop the changing seasons but can better appreciate the unique experience that each has to offer. Like the shortening days and earlier sunsets, we can learn to more truly appreciate the time that we have when we recognize that the daylight doesn’t last forever. Like the crops, orchards, and gardens, we can value the season of verdent growth, but can only truly savor the yield of produce at the time of harvest. The wisdom and experience and perspective gained with aging and trials of life can bear great fruit if we let them. Like the changing leaf colors and morphing fireweed, different kinds of beauty can be found with each stage of life, though the appearance in the mirror may greatly differ. Perhaps it is more a resistance to change than anything else that keeps us fearful of the transition to the autumn of life. Facing the reality and inevitability of change and seeking the blessings it brings can help us enjoy and even embrace the season ahead. We can find new ways to use the hard-earned fruits of our labors and difficulties to help others. We can find a peace and satisfaction in the harvest of our lives. As the author of Ecclesiates reminds us “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven…a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted…[God] has made everything beautiful in its time (Ecc 3:1, 3:2, 3:11).”
