Living at the Edge

A fall trail beckons with color. A soft breeze sifts a motivational morning chill through light layers, warm blood flows under cool skin, legs drive me uphill, moving me forward, generating warmth. Winter lies ahead, summer, now part of my past, is blending with the pleasant memory of many seasons.

Seasons define the passage of time, they are the personality of nature, the personality of life. They have expectations, givens if you will. Summer is sun, summer is long days, blue skies, and bare feet. Winter is boots and snow, cold and skis, it is dark, long nights and bare branched trees. My preference is their edges, the transitional seasons, a time when nature appears less static. A time when spring’s soft green bends under an elegant, white layer of a tardy winter storm, or a frosty fall morning softens below a summer-like sun.

Seasonal edges have depth, they offer a look forward, a promise of what is to come, while maintaining a light grip on the past.

Fall is my immediate future, it surrounds me with brilliant colors as seasonal foliage, losing its once-firm grasp on life, randomly floats towards a forest floor, my steps cushioned by the thickening carpet. Leafless branches allow me to look forward, look beyond the trees towards snowcapped peaks and see the cold reality of the coming winter, the cold reality of an aging life.

Motion, moving forward, creating memories, has been the focus of my existence. I cannot live life without moving. Most of my summers are behind me and fall is slipping away. I can see the leading edge of winter. Memories of an active past feed an ambition fueled by my imagination and my willingness to match my pace with time. My past has given me a better understanding of life, an understanding that allows my waning vision to see more than gathered light. Experience softens my touch, it lets me sense a shifting breeze or caress the subtle beauty beneath the surface. All that I have done flows through me, it is the filter through which I see today, it is the filter of my future.

Mike Bennett