The Bridge

September has always felt different from the other months.

Maybe because it doesn’t completely belong anywhere.

It is not really summer anymore, although summer is still around. And it is not quite autumn yet, although we can already feel autumn approaching.

September stands somewhere in between.

Like a bridge.

At one end of that bridge, summer is still waving goodbye. The afternoons can still be warm. The trees are mostly green. We can still sit outside and feel the sun on our faces. Sometimes, for a few hours, we can almost convince ourselves that nothing has changed.

But then morning comes.

We open the door and the air feels different.

A little cooler. A little fresher.

Maybe we need a light jacket for the first time in months. Maybe we notice one yellow leaf on a tree that was completely green only a few days ago. Maybe the evening arrives a little earlier than we expected.

Small things.

But September is made of small things.

It doesn’t announce the change loudly. It whispers it.

That is what I love about this month.

September doesn’t close the door on summer and immediately open another one to autumn. It gives us a hallway between the two. A little space where we can look backward and forward at the same time.

Behind us are the long summer evenings, vacations, open windows, ice cream, green trees, and days when darkness seemed reluctant to arrive.

Ahead of us are colourful leaves, cooler walks, sweaters, warm drinks, rainy afternoons, and all the beautiful little things that make autumn feel like autumn.

And here we are, somewhere between them.

Crossing the bridge.

I think life gives us many Septembers, even when the calendar says something else.

We are constantly standing between what was and what will be.

Between an ending and a beginning.

Between an old routine and a new one.

Between the person we used to be and the person we are slowly becoming.

We often want to rush through those places. We want certainty. We want to know where we are going. We want to reach the other side as quickly as possible.

But perhaps being in between is not something we need to escape.

Perhaps it is something we need.

A bridge is not a destination, but that doesn’t make it unimportant.

Without the bridge, we cannot reach the other side.

September reminds me of that.

It reminds me that change doesn’t always have to happen suddenly. Sometimes it arrives one degree at a time. One shorter evening. One cooler morning. One golden leaf.

Nature doesn’t wake up on September 1st and decide that summer is over.

It takes its time.

And maybe we should too.

There is something comforting about watching the seasons change slowly. It reminds us that we don’t always have to transform our lives overnight. We don’t need to have everything figured out before taking the next step.

Sometimes we simply need to keep walking.

I also think that is why September carries a strange mixture of feelings.

There is a little nostalgia in it because something beautiful is ending.

But there is excitement too, because something beautiful is beginning.

We can miss summer and still look forward to autumn.

We can be grateful for what is behind us without wishing to return to it.

We can welcome what is coming without rushing toward it.

Two feelings can exist together.

September understands that better than most months.

Perhaps that is why its light seems different. The sun is still warm, but softer somehow. The evenings feel quieter. The first changing leaves appear among thousands that are still green.

Summer hasn’t disappeared.

Autumn hasn’t completely arrived.

And for a short time, we get to have a little of both.

There is beauty in that temporary place.

Soon, the bridge will end.

The mornings will become colder. The green will slowly turn to yellow, orange, and red. Leaves will begin covering the sidewalks. Autumn will no longer be something we can sense approaching.

We will be standing inside it.

But I don’t want to hurry there.

I want to enjoy the crossing.

I want to notice the warm September afternoons and the cool September mornings. I want to watch the colours appear slowly. I want to see summer fading without treating its departure as something sad.

Because September reminds me that endings and beginnings don’t always stand on opposite sides of life.

Sometimes they meet.

Sometimes they overlap.

Sometimes there is a beautiful little bridge between them.

And maybe our job is not always to choose which side we belong to.

Maybe sometimes our job is simply to walk slowly across, look around, and appreciate the view.

I’m in no hurry to reach the other side.

GK