Autumn

“It's a season,” we say to parents of small children to remind them that the exhausting intense period of sleeplessness and body fluid management will give way to more existential parenting.

We say it to struggling students and parents of young adults making questionable choices. “It's a season” of moving, or job hunting, or being single, or getting divorced. Life is lived in seasons.

Middle age is autumn.

Middle age is not frosty, drizzly, late November, but it is past labor day. The nip is in the air. The blooms are past their prime. Green vibrancy and enthusiasm gives way to the sunset colors of experience and perspective.

Middle age is autumn. Life is more empty nests than filling ones. The raucous honking of migration toward different summers sounds bitter sweet in the sunset. Seeds helicopter dramatically away from the only home and nurture they have ever known. Autumn winds are for scattering.

Middle age is autumn. Things are slowing a little, and rustling rather than hustling. The roots are deepening, and priorities are moving away from showy foliage. Supple pliancy is hardening into resolved strength. Dead branches are pruned away.

Middle age is autumn. All the energy of so many summer days is now bearing fruit. Those seeds sown in the careless early warmth are now readying for reaping. It is the harvest born of easier days, and the laying up for harder ones. It is when the real fruit can be tested; bitter, sweet, or worm eaten.

Autumn is the testing grounds of summer’s vitality. Even the useless woody shells of ornamental gourds and fruit were beautiful blossoms and verdant green leaves in late spring.

Middle age is autumn.