Harvest Moon

I went to visit a friend at the hospital tonight, all the way out north.  I parked my car, turned it off and just sat there forever gazing at the Harvest Moon.

I love the Fall. It is my favorite season. It always has been.  The leaves turn beautiful colors. Mums are everywhere. It's the best time to snuggle with those around you, sip hot cider and enjoy chilly evenings.  Just thinking about the Fall, I can already smell the pumpkin pie and apple-cinnamon candles.  It's time to change my decor and bedding from the light bright airy summer colors to the deep rich warm colors that take the chill out of winter.

Soon, we will be carving the pumpkins and then the turkey. In no time at all the little trick-or-treaters will be scaling my neighborhood in search of porch lights.  As always, I will be clinging to the last Fall moments before snow comes, by refusing to remove my ginormous pumpkins until they are so flat on my stairs that I have to scrape them up with a shovel--haha

Back to the Harvest Moon....we often ignore it even though its very size and color boast for our attention.  What a gift it is to the farmer, though. Picture the farmers in days of old.  The Harvest Moon originally signaled that it was time to bring in the crops(harvest). They didn't have the machinery that we have now. Time was of the essence. They began at the crack of dawn and continued till dark and all of the hard work in the world couldn't buy an extra hour from the sun.  What a blessing the bright moon was, almost touching the earth.  It was as if God lit a giant lantern so they could finish their task.

In the city, we have so much light that few people ponder its value. If you have ever been in the country or on a beach on a cloudy starless night and felt the helplessness of the tide coming in with no visibility, you know the power the Harvest Moon yields.

Unfortunately, with all of the modern day conveniences, I am sure that few farmers give much mind to it anymore.

Tonight it feels like an old friend to me.  I've admired it my whole life.  It actually seems timely with where I am at in my life. It is like a signal of a harvest in my life. It comes as a friendly reminder every night, that my fields need to be removed.  On one hand, I know it is inevitable. Fields need a break so that the soil can be renewed. Nothing grows in a parched field.

Even as it sits close to the Earth every night, shining enough light for me to do the job in its entirety, beckoning me to do what needs to be done, I hesitate a bit and struggle against it. What needs to be removed is something that I have been protecting and growing and watering for many years.  Against my greatest efforts, it is dehydrated and fails to reproduce.

Yet, it is not mine, it never was. Nothing on this Earth is truly ours. We develop an attachment to things in our life, but ultimately we live in the illusion of possession. 

Soon, before the Harvest Moon runs its seasonal course and returns to its normal position in the sky, I need to wield the cycle, remove the crop and till the soil.  I could pass on this task a while longer, as I have, but soon, all signs of life will be completely gone.