...nothing gold can stay.

~Robert Frost

~*~

These are the last, final days of autumn. We've forgotten about her, haven't we, knee deep in the holiday cheer that consumes us all this week. There are brown paper packages and the scent of newly baking cookies and the sweet layering of saints and snow and softly falling dreams. Winter is almost here, and with her comes the Solstice, the return of the Light...a promise. And Autumn stands, in tattered rags, ready to fade away, already forgotten.

Autumn is my favorite season, so it's with mixed emotions that I approach the Solstice. Now, there's no going back. There will be no more reprieve from winter until Spring. I live in Buffalo, that proverbial snow-clad beast who wallows through the white until (jokingly believed) July. Autumn...Autumn is different. It has sadness, yes...sharpness, yes...but there is such beauty in each singular, suspended moment that we're reminded why we're here.

In all the hustle and the bustle of this final week before Solstice, it is hard to carve out precious moments that belong to solely us...but the entire experience of the Solstice, and the entire experience of the holiday season is one that--if it's approached with reflection and deep magic--could be the most beautiful of them all.

I know I'm challenging myself to carve out those moments, too...but it's more important now than ever before. We're an extra crafty family, and my wife and I are up to all hours now, creating love with nimble fingers as we wrap and glue and sew and snip things into being that we hope our loved ones will cherish...and yet. And yet. We must find time for those quiet moments of reflection, of love, of embracing the dark and the light and the leaving of Autumn and the return of Winter.

This evening, after I've danced (because even in the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, I'm utterly stubborn about still attending belly dance class. ;D), I will light a candle, and I invite everyone to light a candle with me, connected together though far apart...and lovingly bid farewell to Autumn. I will gather all of the leaves I've kept on my altar from my beloved trees, and I will wrap them in brown paper and put them away. I will celebrate that season that holds so very much for us, and I will give my gratitude to her, bidding her farewell, safe journey. And when we finally part, when I have said the final words, I will be ready for Monday...Monday, and the full embracing of winter.

Ritual is that sacred moment where we step outside of the flow of the mundane and embrace that which is holy. To make a sacred space and acknowledge your love and appreciation for the old season fading away to the new one coming now, is powerful, old magic, filled with gratitude and grace, reminding us of our own deeply sacred purposes~

Nothing gold can stay...but the wheel keeps spinning, and we--the watchers, the time keepers, those who feel the turning of the seasons and the turning of time--we will be witness to that great, great dance, as one curtsies and leaves the floor and another takes her place, glittering gown twirling and twirling beneath a thousand dazzling lights...

Farewell, beloved Fall. Until we meet again.


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