Fall is not my favorite time of year. Sure, I enjoy air temperatures lower than 90, and the break from high humidity is nice. Sunsets before 8pm and frost on the grass heralding the slow, long haul towards winter though are all less enjoyable. The lengthy shadows as I drive towards home after work and the gloom lingering in the mornings, both of which will only be exacerbated as time marches on, are not my preference either. It’s no different this year – I still dread the cold and dark and snow and ice – but I’m more aware of the slow change than I have been in prior years.
It could be due to the change in location. I’ve said before, and will continue to do so, that moving 5 miles down the road has been such a change in immediate environment that it feels like a different world. The trees, whose leaves are already starting to turn and fade from green to brown and yellow, are mine for the first time, and we’ve added leaf rakes to our shopping list. The ubiquitous bonfires of fall nights require less planning now that they can be fed from the debris of fallen branches piled on the back hillside, and the marching band at the local high school no longer serenades us on a Friday night. The birds are different too, with far more than sparrows and the occasional screaming blue jay visiting our yard. Both sunsets and sunrises are more visible from our vantage here on the Ridge.
It’s not just the environment that’s changed though. My schedule is different also, and I’ve been in a position (literally, from my living room chair) to observe the change in rhythm as dawn breaks later and later. The neighbor’s rooster was not always the first herald of the rising sun, though he is now; earlier in the summer, the robins and cardinals were the first to greet the day, with the eastern towhee close behind. Now, however, it’s the rooster and the blue jays that win that race, and it won’t be long before the sun is not yet up when I leave. Even the owls are not yet abed sometimes when I first rise. Changes are more noticeable when they occur before your very eyes, I suppose.
All of these slow, small changes serve as a reminder of the Lord’s faithfulness. All things were created by him and for him, and by him all things hold together. (Colossians 1). The moon in the kitchen window night after night and month after month, the sunrise – however late it occurs, the rhythm of the seasons, all in their place because the Lord who does not change holds them there. Reminders are all around us, if we care to look.
You are so right in that a change of venue can make us appreciate the wonders of Gods’ work. You are describing what goes on all around us but few people seem to take the time and notice. God’s wonderous creation set in His perfect timing and rhythm is a joy to behold. As we go through our “seasons” of life, God is still the one who directs our path.