Autumn Promises.

Dear Autumn,

I promise to breathe you in when you get here, and I won’t mind that you arrive late and stay for just a little while, as you tend to do.

I promise to walk outside as much as possible and gaze at those orange moons you prepare for me.

I promise to take in the electricity of my favorite season and use that spark to write, write, and continue to write.

I promise to find the snazziest boots and skirts this side of planet Earth for my autumnal ensembles.

I promise not to worry when the days get shorter and the darkness seems more profound than usual. ‘Tis the season, right?

I promise to get myself to Vermont, Maine, and New Hampshire–places where I know the vivid shades of you are waiting for me on a silver platter.

I promise not to allow the wishes to share my favorite season with a Mister by my side to prevent me from simply taking in your beauty (beauty is beauty, whether accompanied or solo).

I promise, though, to briefly wonder if the Mister might be waiting for me at the end of a leafy path…

I promise to defend you to those who complain about your brevity with a kind just enjoy it.

I promise to spend at least one afternoon outside with a good book and a mug of something yummy.

I promise to regard October and my greeting of a new age with curiosity, goals, and optimism. And if those things should fail, to simply laugh and move on.

I promise not to frown when I see you eventually pulling away from me at the end of your tenure, but to keep you alive with fiction, poetry, and James Taylor’s Walking Man.

Here’s to the coming autumn and enjoying every bit of it.