As summer gradually
ends in September, we dream of relief from oppressive heat and antagonizing mosquitoes
then welcome a pumpkin flavored and scented October as fall slowly tip-toes in with
a landscape so brilliantly painted, people drive, walk, and climb for hours and
sometimes days, delighting in its splendor.
For me, October brings more than pumpkin
lattes and hours of leaf raking. My
favorite month delivers joy and sorrow. This year, my oldest son, Luke, turns
twenty-five, and my youngest son, James, turns eighteen, while their mom adds
another year, an age known only to her closet friends.
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| Luke & Mommy |
Although often ridiculed, I was a mom who
kept her little boys in baby blue and overalls until they were unavailable in
their sizes. I didn't consider Luke and
James little men when they couldn’t talk, walk, or feed themselves. They were
my babies, and I decided to dress them as such. I knew as soon as they wore
khaki pants and knit shirts for the first time, they would resemble men in
their attire from that day forward. Being warned of the brevity of baby days, I
wasn’t ready to trade baby blue for navy or footed pajamas for big boy
sleepwear.
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| Luke |
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| James |
My love for Luke and James strengthens and
my joy being their mom grows with each October birthday, but I don't know too
many moms who don't miss holding their baby boys, watching their wonder at
simple things, or showering them with public affection without embarrassment.
Each October is one year removed from rocking them to sleep, holding
their hands, helping them set up train tracks, reading bedtime stories, baking
special birthday cakes, and tucking them to bed with a stuffed animal or
blanket.  |
| James |
Robert Frost offers an honest reminder of
the transience of life in his poem, "Nothing Gold Can Stay.”
Nature's first green
is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leafs a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leafs a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
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| James |
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
Gold, as a hue, doesn't hold in nature. In
spring, gold buds on the willow tree quickly become leaves. Golden sunsets last
less than an hour.
Life in Eden, with its river Pishon, where
gold was found, quickly sank to grief with the loss of Adam and Eve’s innocence
and their knowledge of good and evil.
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| Luke's graduation Univ. SC |
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James & Katy
Cades Cove, Tenn.
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Through experiences, they now possess knowledge
of the world and make choices while the people who love them most make fewer decisions
for them and pray about the scary concept of free will.
In October, I watch maple leaves turn a
rich red or bright orange, then bright gold, but as quickly as I had packed up baby
blue blankets and pajamas, the gold disappears.
The trees are still there, though, and
those two sons are still mine. They've experienced life, sin and guilt for
twenty-five and eighteen years, and now their innocence, and ours, is found in
God's wisdom and grace, which steps in and declares us blameless when innocence
is gone.
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| Luke |
You found your blanket and took an afternoon nap.
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| Luke & Ralph |
We played with our golden dog and held hands crossing the
street.
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| James |
I drove you to school and put trophies on your shelf.
You picked out a wall color darker than baby blue and did
your homework at night.
You played games with your friends, grew taller and stopped
believing I was right.
When the sky is baby blue, we sit on the porch and talk
about being old.
We laugh. We cry. Then October fades as quickly as gold.
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A happy mom and her sons
Isaqueena Falls, SC
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Happy Birthday Luke and James,
Mom
