The grass withers, the flower fades ... and the writer sets her pen down

When my mom would drive me to elementary school, she would always stop the car in the middle of the road. Sometimes it was to admire the mountains, but in the fall it was to admire the changing colours of the leaves on the trees that bordered a little park near our house.

I would roll my eyes, because I had heard it so many times, “Oh, look! They’re so beautiful.” I guess I saw that they were beautiful, but I didn’t quite appreciate the beauty for what it was. It was boring, or repetitive, or whatever. But for my mom, it wasn’t; each time it was a new discovery and a new reminder of the presence of Christ.

Now in October, as I drive down the road, the trees look like they’re on fire. The blend of yellow to burning red is shocking, really, when you actually stop to look and compare it with the browning of so many other things at this time of year. When the kids were younger, we would try and collect as many as we could in the entire variety of colours, and display them. 

I think autumn is this strange sign of beauty and death and refreshment. It’s a confusing bundle. The air outside provides a feeling of wellness, and when you inhale that cold morning air, standing in your bare feet on the chilled and damp grass, it’s almost like drinking a glass of pure water. And, like I said, there is still colour in the garden and those shockingly beautiful leaves, at the peak of their glory.

Of course, we know that the leaves are changing colour because they are preparing to die. They’ve stopped making food from the sun, the green chlorophyll disintegrates, and the yellow, orange, and red are unveiled: one last show before they fall to the earth and feed the soil. 

The book of Isaiah tells us, “The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God will stand for ever.” I feel like our lives are a series of deaths and renewals. Some of those deaths are painful, sorrowful, regrettable. Some are a release, or one step towards another path. And some renewals are only for a time, or not the will of God.

But many are times of healing, being reinvigorated, or refocusing. If we can meditate on the Christian ideal of dying to one’s self, abandoning our own designs, our pride and sinful inclinations, if we can let those parts of ourselves die in Christ, with Christ, and for Christ, we will be renewed in God’s providence.

There may be a time of bare branches, a coldness or sense of emptiness, but trusting in God, we can be sure that there is a work in motion. The self we have died to can go back into the soil, allowing a new and more promising springtime.

With this in my mind, I want to let any readers I may have know that I have decided to retire from the unspeakable blessing of writing for The B.C. Catholic. Over more than 18 years, there have been times when I have wondered over the great privilege trusted to me, and in the kindness of strangers, siblings in Christ, who have encouraged me and shared parts of their own stories with me after reading something I’ve written. In my writing I have been allowed to gush and spout and wonder and question, and I have not taken it for granted.

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