Fall is such a fun time of year! From cooling temperatures to changing leaves, pumpkins and harvested fields, and football and Halloween decorating. We start unofficially by celebrating Labor Day, trick or treat our way through Halloween, and stuff ourselves full at Thanksgiving to round out the season. While Autumn is all of this and more, we often forget that Fall is also a season to remember.
Halloween comes out of the All Hallows Eve tradition of celebrating the night before All Saints Day. Mexican traditions wrap the days in the Dia de Los Muertos celebrations. It is a time to both mock death with crazy costumes and remember those we have lost. Autumn, in many ways, is the season of remembering.
Most humans live long enough to experience death and loss at a personal level. The people that leave us often leave indelible marks on our lives and our memories. Yet, we tend to wrap ourselves in the pomp and circumstance of Homecoming Weekends and trick-or-treat preparations, often forgetting the foundational time to remember as the year grows old.
Americans are the worst society I can think of at embracing the reality of death. Modern science and medicine veil the pain of loss in so many ways. Death no longer takes place in the home surrounded by loved ones. Death is now relegated to the corners of hospitals and the quiet rooms of Hospice centers. I am by no means disparaging our medical institutions and the fantastic work of our Hospices, but modern death is removed from us, and we are left unable to process the end of a life.
Do yourself a favor this Fall season. Take the time to reflect on the year gone by, grieve for the loved ones lost, and remember with fond memories the ones that have died over the years. They say that grief is the cost we pay for love. If that is true, what a disservice we give to the memory of our beloved when we refuse to pay the bill.
Happy Fall Y’all and may we remember those we will always cherish no matter the season.