Summer seems to just begin when all at once it evaporates into a fleeting memory of backyard barbecues with friends, the sound of lawn mowers moving before it becomes too hot, and pulsating sprinkler heads making that signature, wfop, wfop, wfop sound. The smell of fresh mown grass being watered is the epitome of going green here in the desert southwest.

I find myself a bit melancholy considering the sweet reprieve summer brought from the blustery spring winds. Sadly, summer never lasts as long as I think it will. Fortunately, living in the cooler pines of Ruidoso, fall brings with it its own magic, its own type of reprieve. The vibrancy fall creates has always enchanted me. Lime green, burnt orange, rust red, the colors of a season in transition.

When I think of my life and how I transition from season to season, fall seems to be a fitting and colorful analogy. Consider our youth and how it aligns with the newness of spring: sometimes we are blustery and angry at the slowness of change and progress to a more fruitful, greener time like summer. The playfulness of summer and the fresh green tender leaves of trees as they bud out and prepare to produce fruit is particularly rewarding. The summer of my life has plenty to show for its efforts. As I transition into fall, I reminisce about the lovely season just past, but I also welcome the slowing down, the richness of fall as I survey the changing leaves, the texture that is now present in my life, the depth of color I now possess.

With winter comes an impatience that I never seem to manage well. I miss the freshness and rebirth of spring, the visual beauty and bounty of summer’s produce and fall’s inevitable harvest of lessons from the past year. If I allow it and embrace it, winter is a time of sweet reflection, of slowing down and taking stock of a very full year. It is also a time for going inward to take an assessment of what was and what can be. Our bodies, minds, and souls need the winter of our lives more than we know. Without this going inward, we cannot possibly be prepared to welcome the newness of the spring of our lives that is just around the corner. And, when our life goes green again, we will have a heightened appreciation for the texturing and layering of life itself.