Life's Seasons

The moon is almost full. Its light soft. Her shadows long and silent. At three o’clock in the morning, I am unsettled on the front porch repeating a mantra of peace in the quiet transition of night and day.

Change is coming. As unstoppable as the seasons, recognized and understood in small but subtle differences each day, each week. It’s high summer, but this morning autumn whispered her intent. Her breath warms the side of my face.

I embrace change, require change, am stimulated by change. But I’ve never been this age. Autumn comes for both of us it seems. Summer has no fear, she’ll be back when the sun is angled high and the days are long.

My life’s summer season is slipping from my hand, her finger tips brushing across my palm, waiting for my grateful acknowledgment of her gifts. The departure is making me feel vulnerable. I can almost see her walking away turning one last time to say goodbye, leaving me with autumn. I don’t know her well. But she doesn’t seem as though she’ll be as compatible for the journey.

Often on nights like these, when the forest is so illuminated, I’ve wanted to wander, to feel her mysteries in a different light. But I am not a nocturnal being, and the woods at night is unfamiliar and may do me harm. There are bears, poisonous snakes, and spiders. I would be at a disadvantage, vulnerable.

Suddenly, I was outraged that I felt vulnerable. I went in the house and picked up the blue flashlight. It’s made from steel, is long and heavy from the weight of four large batteries. But I didn’t need it, the moon provided light enough. What I wanted was something that could be used as a weapon. The realization made me even more angry. I left the flashlight on the porch and walked up our long winding driveway, alone. The dogs whined and pawed at the gate, confused.

When I came to the gravel road I hesitated. This seemed like it was far enough. Fear has a way of making your senses come alive. I stood in the middle of the road, closed my eyes, and tried to see with my ears. The sound of snapping branches close by covered me with goose bumps but I refused to open my eyes. I just listened . . . and waited.

With age comes humility. Acknowledgment of being powerless to stop time. Age also gives power—power of wisdom and hindsight. Power that comes from recovering from great loss and sorrow. Power that comes from learning how to love and allowing yourself to be loved. Power that comes from liking who you have become. And power that comes in finding truth, and the freedom to let go of religion and superstition.

Across the road from our driveway is a trail that escorts one to the top of a ridge line. A pathway, little more than a high tunnel meandering through a swath of emerald, and illuminated now by the calming moonlight. It leads to the vertex with an inspiring vista. But trees have grown too tall, too thick, and in summer provide an obstruction to the panorama.

An increasing trepidation was forcing its way past my resolve to be invincible, or at least, less vulnerable. I opened my eyes and looked into the trail. God, but it was beautiful. I’ve passed it countless times at night as I come home, but my headlights hide the beauty of nature’s luminescence.

I was startled by movement in a branch overhead. A great horned owl! Was he here the whole time, or did he fly in when my eyes were closed? An owl’s flight is silent, their feathers covered in small hooks and bows that break up air turbulence. Any remaining noise is reduced by velvety downy feathers on their wings and legs. Those soft feathers absorb high frequency sounds other animals are sensitive to. A perfect design. The moon was so bright I could see the yellow in his big round eyes. He seemed to have a curious regard for my presence. Lifting one foot from his perch, placing it back down. Then the other. All the while bobbing his head in a circular motion as if trying to focus on what he was looking at. It would seem I had been given a guardian. His presence certainly distracted me from my nervousness. I wasn’t alone, but then one never is while in the forest. Perhaps, I will walk that trail after all.

All my senses on high alert, I stepped off the road and onto the mossy ground. I was tempted to remove my sandals, but I know what this trail looks like in the daylight. Rocks, fallen branches, and pine cones litter the ground, several holes where skunks have dug out yellow jacket nests lie in wait to twist an ankle and always, the possibility of copperheads.

Katydids, by the thousands, fill the air with their summertime chorus. A screech owl somewhere far off, wails a tender, lonesome cry. Different voices drift through the forest at night. Whip-poor-will, once common in the area, are rare to hear now, as are barred owls. Coyotes would come howling and yipping as they ran through the hollows and across the ridge lines, but a bounty has been placed on their heads, so their songs have gone quiet as well. I looked behind me to see if the owl was still there. He was not.

It wasn’t possible to walk quietly. Too many small twigs and crunchy pine cones. I’ve never minded getting older. Never thought about it much. When I turned thirty, I felt empowered, the same at forty. I had really hit my stride at fifty and always enjoyed good health and athletic strength. But never have I felt the rushing of time so apparent or so poignant as I have these last few weeks.

The end of the trail opens up to a small clearing and a star-filled sky. A westerly wind blew down across the ridge and pushed up against my body. I had a keen desire to remove all my clothes and dance with her a while in a lovers’ embrace across the rolling hills, and down into hidden valleys. What secrets unfold there in the early hours of dawn? I would tell no one.

Standing here, looking up at the moon, I realized there are many things I know, many things I’ve learned, that can’t be translated into words. So, I can’t pass them on. Not even to my own children. My understanding of the natural world is where my true intimacy lies and it’s what I would love to teach. It’s how I could change the world. Time is short and I have yet to learn how to translate that gift.

Technology has become the enemy of reverence. We have become so dazzled by our own inventions and in the process, creation seems so much less. Maybe a few will be drawn to her by people like me, by our strong faith and the beauty of our personal lives that comes from that intimacy.

The sun will be trading places soon. I should go back. My dogs and my wife will worry.

Life is long. Life is hard. And life is oh so beautiful. Something happens every day that takes my breath away. Something happens every day that breaks my heart. Even if it’s the memory of someone we loved, no longer here. It’s as much a privilege to feel sorrow as it is to feel joy. Life is long. Time is short.