Night Musings Birthday

September marks the anniversary of my entry into the blog world with Meditations in the Night Watch. Thank you for your encouraging words along the way. I am thankful for each of you!

September is a month of beginnings and endings, of the old and new. Caught somewhere between summer and not-yet-autumn, September is God's pause for reflection, a half-rest in the annual score. It is a time when being pensive is not only permissible but so healthy for our journey into the approaching days of fall and winter. Perhaps you, too, share a wistful acceptance of September, understanding that 'new beginnings often start with a small tear'.

The annual excitement over each school year, new school supplies, and Friday Night Lights in Mississippi used to make September vibrate in my memory. Now in September's wake I see hollow backpacks, forlorn bicycles, and empty beds in our home. As an eleven year old Russell said, "It's all about moving on in life."

So, with my mother's admonition and reminder, I choose to see those empty backpacks and such as but more of the stuff of life that gets left behind when we learn to move on. It doesn't diminish their value or place in our family memories, but it helps us focus on the NEW THING that is coming. Embrace the next chapter, I know to tell myself. Rejoice in the new marriages and relationships that hold a new future for us. Give thanks in all things.

And so I move on with joy and thanksgiving for the day that is today. No time for wasted thinking or whining about aging. Seize this day and pack it full with gratitude! There is yet so much for which to be thankful.

We are surrounded by new beginnings each day!

In our end is our beginning; In our time, infinity, in our doubt there is believing; in our life, eternity. In our death, a resurrection; at the last, a victory. unrevealed until its season, Something God alone can see.

~Hymn of Promise, by Natalie Sleeth

(portion reposted from September 2010)