Journal of Sacred Work

The trees on the hospital lawn
are lush and thriving. They too
are getting the best of care…
-Mary Oliver   

     You can feel the light, as well as see it. It crosses away from us leaving us in colder shadows. Summer trails in the distance like an old dog left to slink off where he can die in his own way.
   Spring is not the most dramatic change of season. It’s fall. The dying time. The light begins to depart early. The lights in the hospital parking lot ostrich their plumed heads into the dark. Nurses departing at the evening shift change walk more carefully to their cars. There are too many shadows to feel safe…..

   The weight of summer’s heat and aridity have hurt the southern trees.
They will not dress the air as brightly this year. Orange may never
emerge between green and brown.
    We want to be able to enjoy every season. We never know which day will be our last.
   Almost everybody says that what they want from life is to be happy. As we have often discussed on these pages, it may be more of a blessing to live a rich life rather than a happy one. And more possible.
   There’s a certain mindlessness in some of the happiness plugged on television and in popular magazines. Movie stars always seem to be smiling in the photos. But then we read about their darker lives – all the drugs and depression and trips into rehab.
  This autumn will be the last season for many with terminal illness. It will be the last fall for Dr. Randy Pausch, who’s last lecture will live awhile longer on the internet. And it will be the first season for many more – too tiny to know, yet, what season they are living. 
   We live somewhere in between the shadows.

-Erie Chapman