What is it...

What is it that allows us to embrace change? Seriously -- don't you think it's incredible how we can somehow anticipate and even hope for transition, season after season? This, quite honestly, astonishes me...

What is it that makes us willing -- even anxious -- to leave something good for something different? I would never call myself a revolutionist, but I can observe the pattern in my own life; something in us always finds a way to override the fear and negative possibilities (and sometimes even probabilities) of the unknown. The world keeps turning and changing, with or without our consent -- and more often than not, "with."

What is it that greases the wheels of the passage of time, as the calendar rolls from month to month? How can I find myself satisfied by summer's departure -- even when I know some of the heartache that winter brings? How can I be exhilarated by the autumn -- by the colorful death of those tender green leaves? How can I even look past the autumn to the wonders of winter? I don't understand how it is possible, and yet I already find myself humming Christmas melodies and thinking warmly of the golden glow of a Amsterdam brownhouse with a steaming cup of warme chocolademelk, crested with slagroom.

What is it about candlelight that entrances us and captivates us? It romances us with its orange hues and swaying sensitivities. Children instinctively understand its appeal. My four-year-old son begs us every evening now, to turn off the electric lights and set the house aglow with candles, candles, candles -- the candles that make us forget that we would have still been playing outside at this time of day, just two months ago...

What is it about a fresh perspective on something old and familiar that creates an epiphany? A new season becomes a time for renewed hope. A tired fixture of the home becomes a classical work of art. And a heart settled becomes a heart aflight.