I pick September

SOME like May. Others prefer July or August. I glory in them, too, but my pick month is September. I don't know just why, but the crispness in the air feels wonderfully good, though it plays havoc with my hair. Fall is what it does, and I have to fuss with it, but there is something in the air that makes up for the inconvenience. Suddenly the clothes I've enjoyed wearing all summer are faded and limp. How good it feels to slip into a woolen sweater, slacks, comfortable shoes, and go on a long walk.

I notice the leaves starting to fall. Here and there dazzling red branches stand out against the sea of green. They are even more striking than when the whole display is brilliant. It is most definitely a time to live in the present, to drink in the beauty and not worry that the branches will soon be bare and the winds chill.

Now there are flowers to enjoy on all sides, dancing in the wind, their seeds scattering, only God knows where, to pop up and surprise us next year. I pass some children coming home from school excitedly talking with new classmates about their strict new teacher and admiring one another's shoes.

To me it seems like a beginning as well as an ending, and I wonder why the new year doesn't start now rather than in the dead of winter. For some it does.