Letting go has its own beauty and season in time

Friday would be a sunny, warm 80 degrees in October, followed by a drop to 65 degrees the next day with rain and wind likely. We had changed my son’s senior portraits session three times now due to the pandemic, and this day was the last day we would have summer temperatures.

It was the last schedule change we could make—and at least this time it’s a change we can see coming.

On the very last day of our Indian summer, my son posed for those oh-so-precious senior portraits down by the Columbia River. For some shots, he’s a serious young man; in others he’s a goofy boy; and in another he’s flashing a devil-may-care smile that reminds me of his dad. Or maybe my dad, I think.

And for kicks, he changes into a white button-down and tie, with a Superman T-shirt underneath. The photographer gets comic action shots of him play-acting Superman’s metamorphosis from ordinary man into superhero—energized by the sun’s power—to do extraordinary things.

And it all fits together so perfectly in that moment—it almost takes my breath away—there he is. There’s my happy, loving, sunshine boy—so soon to emerge into the world as a man with his own destiny to map out. He will have many more 80 degree days of sunshine and green grass growing along the river—many more transformations from ordinary to superhero, and back again.

But all that day I couldn’t stop asking myself—what would I do if I knew this would be my last sunny warm day here by the river?

The forecast was clear—cool temperatures and rain were coming—and what a blessing it was because I could see it clear-eyed and unflinching. After this day, it all changes.

It won’t ever be the same again because he’s not a boy any more—he’s a man who is leaving home in a few short months. And when he does return home—to the river, and the park with its green grass, and our home—it won’t be quite the same. His homecomings will never be the same again because he will never return again as a child, even though I remain forever his mother.

The next day comes—it’s here now. It brings rain and blue-gray clouds with the wind swirling leaves of red-orange and yellow. And I welcome it.

I’ve forgotten how gorgeous this season is as I watch the colorful fire maple branches circle in the wind and leaves start to twirl downward, letting go. They let go.

Letting go has it’s own beauty and its own season in time.

Ecclesiastes 3:1 reads, “To everything there is a season—and a time to every purpose under Heaven”— just like that last sunny day in an Indian summer that gives way to the first cool day in fall.