I have the nose of a canine police dog when it comes to sniffing out the fresh melancholy of an approaching autumn. It started early. Nearing my return to Washington Elementary, I felt it. Not really sick, nor worried. I tried to describe the feeling to my mother. She checked the usual spots. Forehead. No fever. She rubbed my stomach. “Not in my belly really, closer to my heart,” I directed, “kind of jimbly.” She smiled, not in the “something was funny” kind of way, but in the “I know exactly what you’re feeling.” I sat on her lap. “Summer is ending,” she said, “we’ll miss it, won’t we?” “Yes,” I said. “But school is starting, and you love school.” “Yes,” I said, and really meant it. “You’re just fluttering in between. We call it melancholy.” “Melancholy?” It sounded dangerous. “It’s not bad. It’s good actually. A gentle easing into something new. Between the letting go and the moving on. You get to feel the love of both. I think that’s why it feels so full.” I liked that explanation. And I began to like the feeling. Embracing it with the change of each season.
It came this morning. Filling me from head to toe. Jimbling around my heart. And I am not afraid. I am lapped in my mother’s love, between two adorations — summer’s fun and autumn’s lessons — and I am saved.
