The temperature is really winding down and the days are definitely getting shorter. Fall is my favorite time of year, but this year I have been holding onto summer. The truth is that I am a little afraid that this fall is going to bring me a bag full of emotions that I am not quite ready to deal with.
I flounder in mini panic attacks when I think about Matilda's birthday and the dates that will follow. We completely skipped fall last year. We sat in a hospital room, while the world carried on around us. The season that has always brought me joy will now coincide with the pain that I endured while my newborn struggled to survive.
I had my first pumpkin coffee last week and it brought me right back to the hospital, to shift changes with nurses carrying in a cup from down the street. Of walks to Starbucks and of days staring out the window as the leaves changed in Central Park. I could not help but cry.
And yet, I want more. More cups of pumpkin coffee, more leaves under my feet, more candles burning brightly. Seasons bring change and fall is full of newness. Tyler and Matilda have not been coming to church with me and Parker. I need church like I need air, but without my family it has felt incomplete. So as this new season turned, a new mass time opened up at the university. The church is large, the crowd is small (although I was impressed at the amount of college-aged students in attendance). And so we went as a whole family. And it felt good, really good.
Hello fall, Matilda has missed you.
