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Friday, August 17, 2012

Hiatus over

It's been a long summer....hot, sticky, unnerving.  It unfolded too fast, after a very unsettling spring.
A series of events clouded my thinking, took my breath away and forced me to look at one day at a time; let go of the mundane issues of the day. 

When someone you love dies, there's no quick fix for the pain.  The days, though, have to be played out whether it's fair weather or not.

Details are too excruciating to explain the loss and how the hot summer affected the core of the sorrow.  The trail of death goes beyond one heart.  It causes a fracture amongst many.  In ninety-five degrees, we stumbled around the edges, the reality of it and attempted to disguise the what ifs.  If you had, if she had, if we had, if......

And now it's August.  As the eight month draws to an end, the leaves of the birch trees lose their emerald green glow and forest fronds begin to curl and turn brown.  I don't have to look at the calendar to know summer is almost over. Although plans are being made on how to deal with the winter, the truth is spring will hold the answer as to how well we've adjusted to the absence of one heart.  I've warmed a little to the notion that spring can come and it can be good. 

But before I leap that far, I have to finish summer, embrace the decline of it, turn on a light as the days grow shorter, shore up a few logs in preparation for the reality of a deep frost, the snow and ice.  And I will write...reviews, short stories and send Moon Shadow, my latest novel, off to market.

Moon Shadow is about a young woman who marries the man of her dreams.  Her spring heart is full of love and grandiose plans for the future.  But the weather changes quickly and his winter comes before her wedding flowers wilt.  Will she adjust to the disappointment, the uncertainty?  Can she hide behind work, the community?  She's the preacher's wife and must carry out her duties.  Intimacy, fulfillment, happiness at her fingertips; is it too much to ask?  Soon she learns it takes more than the passing of time to find inner peace.  Moon Shadow isn't over until the season of hope returns.

So I grasp the future once more, the change of season, ready to get lost in my work.  Fall is like a warm scarf for the soul.  It wraps around you in a variety of color, aromas, sounds.  It makes you think about winter, reminds you to prepare for the unexpected.  With autumn's cool wind at your back, you have to move on.  You're stronger, ready to embrace what unfolds. 

www.wilemerson.com