One early evening after dinner, Rose, 2 1/2, bright blond hair in a spiky ponytail, says suddenly, “Starka! The sun is going!” We open the front door, step onto the porch, and look directly west. The brilliant sphere is a dazzling orange due to smoke particles from fires in the next county. It hangs just above the evening fog bank approaching from the coast. And it is sinking quickly. “Going, going,” I say softly. “It’s going,” she echoes in that sweet childish voice. Then, with a faint sparkly flash, the sun is extinguished and evening begins wrapping chill arms around our neighborhood. She sighs and turns back into the house to play.

It dawned on me recently that no other season makes us think about the passage of time like autumn. The slow dying of the year, glorious in its demise, reminds us that summer is past (quickly, it always seems in retrospect), and year’s end is in sight. And a weird thing happens. Despite having experienced a fair number of life’s seasons, invariably I (or someone in my household) will say, “Boy, the days are getting shorter!” It’s like we’ve landed on some planet where the celestial timetable is a real surprise.

It is a season of sensory overload tinged with a slight melancholy. Have you felt that first very particular kind of morning chill yet, caught the scent of woodsmoke from a fireplace (where such things are not yet banned)? Made your first big pot of soup? Apple pie? And then there is that afternoon when the light is golden and shimmery with a translucence that takes your breath away.

Here in Sonoma County, harvest is in full swing. Trucks heaped high with fruit hurry along roads and highways, rushing grapes from vineyard to crush pad. And leaves are slowly turning in 60,000 acres of vines.

Recently I came across a quote by Betsy Cañas Garmon that sums up a good perspective on the season:

Somewhere along the way, I realized that the new year doesn’t begin for me in January. The new and fresh has always come for me in the Fall. Ironically, as leaves are falling like rain, crunching beneath my feet, I am vibrating with the excitement of birth and new beginnings. My year begins in Autumn. 

Professional cleaning businesses will tell you that fall, ironically, is the best time of year to spring clean. With all those windows open, allergens sneak in during spring and summer, along with a general coating of dust. Critters like to be warm, too, so webs and those nasty little pods have got to go. Then there are the approaching holidays.

Although this is not a household tips website, the perspective is worth considering:

• Has that dedicated time of prayer and the Word gotten a little sloppy? There were lots of places to go, things to do in those lazy, crazy days of summer. It can be easy in that season to neglect the disciplines.
• Have some “personal conflicts” sneaked in? Don’t let them percolate. Prayerfully, humbly, purposefully, deal with them.
• Do you need to decumulate? Although cleaning out closets, drawers, boxes in the garage is always a good idea, what about personal attitude? With “everything going on in the world”, has negativity spun a web in your thoughts and, therefore, your words? Have you begun assuming the worst? It is astonishing how easily we drift toward negativity. It poisons the atmosphere in the home. It poisons relationships. It is a portal for spiritual downward drift. You can’t “vibrate with new beginnings” with a mind coated in pessimism.

This beautiful season is the perfect time for a personal audit. Forget those New Year’s Resolutions. Make them now.