Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Reflections on Autumn

 
What gorgeous days we've been having. Everything feels so fresh and somehow more settled too. Welcome happy autumn!
 
I found myself reading about autumn this morning, and found the many descriptions of autumn poignant too, especially as we have been celebrating my husband Eric's 50th birthday here at our home with family (this weekend) and friends (tonite). While sharing in his milestone, and at this momentous time as well, I am feeling surprisingly grounded today and grateful to be entering this season of ripened age with him as we collectively embark on the new season that is simultaneously unfolding with the completion of 2012 and the energy shifts many of us are feeling now. It is indeed a change of seasons in our global community as well as we embark on the dawning of a new world cycle.
 
With all of our hard work behind us, so to speak, the living and the learning, the digging in the dirt and the healing, the transforming and alchemal morphing inside the great cocoon, the coming out the other side, somewhat!, lol, to see the light of day again, and all of the laughs, and torments and enlightenments and adventures we have lived both inside ourselves and outside in the world, we really do, and by "we" I mean so many of us who have been walking the Path this last cycle, we have created and cocreated such an incredible foundation of experience and internal shifts that we will surely employ as we continue to unfold ourselves and move forward both individually and collectively into a new world cycle. It is not suprising to me, somehow, that many of us, the baby boomers and the collective family of light, are also moving together into our autumnal years.
 
 
Here are some key insights and points about Autumn:
 
Autumn: a time of full maturity, especially the late stages of full maturity or, to be in the autumn of one's life.
 
In North America, autumn is usually considered to start with the September equinox - and has a Harvest Association:
 
Association with the transition from warm to cold weather, and its related status as the season of the primary harvest, has dominated its themes and popular images.

In Western cultures, personifications of autumn are usually pretty, well-fed females adorned with fruits, vegetables and grains that ripen at this time. Many cultures feature autumnal harvest festivals, often the most important on their calendars.




These are all pertient to the coming of age my husband has been experiencing as well. More...

There are also the many North American Indian festivals tied to harvest of autumnally ripe foods gathered in the wild, the Chinese Mid-Autumn or Moon festival, and many others. The predominant mood of these autumnal celebrations is a gladness for the fruits of the earth mixed with a certain melancholy linked to the imminent arrival of harsh weather.

This view is presented in English poet John Keats poem To Autumn, where he describes the season as a time of bounteous fecundity, a time of 'mellow fruitfulness'.




What a momentous time, this 2012, to be entering the Harvest Season of our lives. And to my beautiful birthday mate, I say once again, Happy 50th Birthday, and what a momentous time you have chosen to enter this new season of life. It's been wobbly for him. But not without great meaning and focus. And I am grateful he walks there ahead of me, preparing me too, to notice these changes and reflection points. Namaste, and happy autumn baby.
 
Ode to Autumn: But then fall comes, kicking summer out on its treacherous ass as it always does one day sometime after the midpoint of September, it stays awhile like an old friend that you have missed. It settles in the way an old friend will settle into your favorite chair and take out his pipe and light it and then fill the afternoon with stories of places he has been and things he has done since last he saw you. ~ Stephen King, Salem's Lot