The Humbling Month

The Humbling Month

Oct 01, 2024

Yesterday, I had to drive to the Homeless Depot with a hand shading my eyes from the glare of the sun.  It had settled low into the horizon in the afternoon, so low that the visor on the car was too high.  Everyone facing west was doing the same thing, some sort of odd salute to the arrival of October. 

I have to say, October is one of my favorite months of the year.  I hold some resentment for September, mainly because it is no longer summer.  School begins and I am in desperate need for more time to accomplish all the chores outside.  September is sort of the whoopee cushion of reality.  It tells me that I am mortal and totally inundated with things to do.   It lets out that embarrassing sound of “you won’t do it all.”  I find myself always landing on that whoopee cushion of reality in September. 

October offers a bit of a reprieve in an odd way.  I slowly have accepted that some of the chores will not be accomplished.  My daughter is now fully immersed in school.  The days take on a repetition that will only be interrupted by the holidays.  Perhaps it is that cycle that lends a sense of control again.  I know that it is all an illusion, that daylight is getting shorter.  That eventually the weather will turn cold.  That all the tasks I have are there regardless of the month of year.  Yes, the damn painting on the trim of the garage will probably be stuck halfway completed from when I left off last October.  

I hate myself for not being able to accomplish it all. 

I hate that I have limits. 

But October sort of puts the brakes on the frenetic pace of life.  I may be working as hard (and harder, to be honest) as in the middle of the summer.  October doesn’t care.  The leaves fall, the wheel turns.  

I find myself looking more inward than outward.  I know part of that is the Celt in me, the Irish perspective of death joining life when the veil is so thin.  

It is Death that tells me not to take myself so seriously. 

What I mean by that, is my time on this earth is not measured by what I can do, but who I have helped and brought some joy to.  I could get all my tasks done.  I could find my dreams all fulfilled.  But the October in my life reminds me that nothing matters beyond mattering to others.  And making others matter more than I matter.  I am just another leaf fluttering to the ground from what was a beautiful big canopy of leaves.    

Perhaps that is what October is.  The humbling month.  No wonder the Jewish feast of Yom Kippur happens in October.  That idea of finding oneself humbled and asking for forgiveness for any transgressions is appealing to me.  And here in the Northern Hemisphere, nature gives us the example that there is only so much time.  That time will pass.  That we will too.  And what matters is that we served others in joy.  

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