Sunday Evening

"May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." — Romans 15:13

It is Sunday evening and September has started.

The week was a quiet one. Monday I sat with a prayer that had no words in it and the wordlessness was its own kind of answer. Dan called Tuesday, the way he always does, and told me about the children starting school and Beth painting the hallway and I laughed at the thought of Earl with a paintbrush. Wednesday I was in the kitchen all morning with tomatoes, putting up the last of what the garden gave, and the jars are on the shelf now, fourteen of them, still warm in my mind if not on my hands. Thursday the garden and I came to an understanding about what is finishing and what is not. Friday the school buses came back to the road and I watched them from the window and thought about Olivia and Jack and Emma and all the children everywhere who are starting something they do not yet understand. Yesterday Isaiah reminded me that waiting is not nothing. Waiting is flying.

The pews were fuller this morning. The air has changed. The program year is starting. My class will meet in a few weeks and the chairs are still in their circle and the room is ready when the children are.

I am not anxious about the fall. I said this last week and I mean it more this week. Something about September settles me the way April unsettles me. Spring is all beginning and no knowing. September is knowing. The garden knows. The church knows. The light knows. I know.

Until next Sunday.