Changing seasons

It's definitely fall. On Friday when I was walking to work, the gingko tree was dropping all of its leaves--the ground was covered, and it almost looked like it was snowing.

The seasons are also changing in my life--I think that's a good share of the "blackness" I talked about in my last post.

So what are the seasons of life? Well, if your life is a year, there are four seasons in a year, and the average lifespan of a person is 80 years (give or take), each season is 20 years. So springtime is the time of everything being new--so that would be ages 0-20. Summer is when everything is "hot" and fruits are rapidly developing--that would be ages 20-40, the prime times of career and family. Fall is 40-60, and winter is 60-you meet new life in heaven with Jesus.

But just like the weather doesn't always pay attention to the calendar, neither does our life-- there are days during spring that feel more like summer, and an "Indian Summer" isn't unexpected. While I'm not 40 yet, the winds of fall are beginning to appear--ever since the miscarriage in March, I've started showing signs of perimenopause--the details are more than you want to know :)

The problem is, my whole life has been aimed at achieving "summer" stuff. I don't know what my goals are for winter and fall, and I don't want to be done with "summer" activities. I think I have good company--who isn't sad when school starts (even though it's still August) and the pool closes, when watermelon becomes scarce, and the stores start advertising Christmas (or at least it's how it feels!)

I wouldn't say I'm having a mid-life crisis--I just want to hang onto summer for as long as I can--I'm not ready for fall!

Here's an example of why:
Yesterday we were shopping at Target, and had just succeeded in our mission to find a dark skinned baby doll for our shoebox that's bound for an orphanage in Nigeria. Here's the conversation as we walked by the baby gear section:
Harmony: Mooooom, when are we gonna get a baby? A real baby?
Me (ouch! Ouch! Ouch!): When God sends us one.
Harmony: Well, I want God to grow one in your tummy.
Me: Do you think it would be a brother or a sister?
Henry and Harmony at the same time: A brother!

Conversations like that make me think that God's not done with our family yet....so it can't be fall yet! I know God has given fall and winter babies before (Sarah, Hannah, Elizabeth), but that's a hard row to hoe physically....ugh. It's hard to be patient when you hear the clock ticking!