Suddenly It's Autumn

I don’t know how it is where you are, but there seems to be a different feel in the air these past few days, and suddenly aware of autumn−as trees prepare to shed their summer dress, but first costume themselves in high color to celebrate the autumn evening. And one of these mornings the grass will be white and crisp, and the fields will take on quieter color, before winter steps in and covers them with white sheets. Aside from the beauty, the naturalness, the wonder of it all, what always strikes us is that it comes so suddenly. We remember only yesterday hearing the children talk of being soon out of school − but the summer has slipped by, and now they are back at their books. We remember only yesterday watching the last snow melting, and farmers plowing spring fields. Only yesterday, we remember looking for the first sign of leaves to show. Only yesterday (or so it seems) we remember the rush of Christmas shopping, and the wonder of Christmas morning; the new year; February, Easter, May and Memorial Day; June and commencement; and July, August; then summer is gone − and suddenly it’s autumn. Wonderful as it all is, yet too many summers have slipped from us without our having done a thousand things we had meant to do − things we had solemnly said “this year” we would do, with family and friends − when school was out, when summer came. But summer slipped away − and suddenly it’s autumn. And too much of life itself has slipped, as spring has been succeeded by summer, and by all the successive seasons. And when it is autumn, it is almost winter; and when it is winter we had better have the harvest behind us. Scrambling for lost time is an unhappy occupation. We can buy the harvest of the farmer’s field. We can buy apples by the bushel. We can buy all the material things that another man has made. But in life we cannot buy a year or a month or a minute. And with the seasons and the years slipping by so suddenly, surely we should sharpen our sense of values; surely we should look at everyone and everything around us and ask ourselves what really matters most − for suddenly it’s autumn.