I think of Fall as the season of thanksgiving. If you follow the Northern European Pagan calendar, Fall started August 1. I have a mixed relationship to that notion. I’m all about giving thanks and deep gratitude any time you want. The sun really does change, and that’s what guides those designation, and yet, and yet, and yet… it’s my favorite time of summer, dog days or no. Swimming pools, skinny dipping under August moons, corn on the cob and tomatoes until you cry for respite. (haven’t reached that point yet. hallelujah!) Easy enough to give thanks, but ask any farmer, these are deep summer activities. They don’t give way until the frost comes. So Fall is sort of a moving target.

But whether we like it or not, we’re back to work. When the Sun isn’t quite as hot as it’s been, when there is some pleasant shade, it’s time they tell us, to get back to work. Even in my grief, when I have long moments when nothing other than staring into space can grab my attention, there’s a place at the back clamoring for attention. I have a service and a sermon I’ve been waiting all summer to write. So what if my brain feels like one of those extra large pocket book that’s filled to the brim with miscellany? I know the stuff is in there. I’ll sort it out.

The world won’t wither for lack of my attention, but it is time. There are many things wrong. There is war. There is bullying. There is pollution and global warming. There are people doing without, whether that’s food, shelter, health care… or even simple kindness.

At the beginning of the year, we started dreaming dreams of peace. We cleared out the undergrowth in our lives, prepared the fields, sowed and tended those dreams. It’s now time to begin to reap the harvest and put it to work. Do you have a project to create? Take the sweet breath of these cool mornings and get to work. Are you simply going to be a kinder person? Get going. Are you picking up trash and enlisting others. bend and stoop. Let’s figure out how many bonus points on Weight Watchers you get for picking up trash…

There’s much to stand in the way of dreaming. I thought I had a pretty solid handle on where I would be building way stations of Peace. But grief is a miasma that clouds our minds. And yet I know I’m dreaming still. The moments of clarity I have can be used for more than washing blankets.

And this is my world. Your world. Our World. We have work to do… We have people to connect with. We have Peace to make. There is no one else. And while we simply gnash our teeth, little pieces of our world die… people, animals, ecosystems, great forests. So, upsadaisy! here we go. Peace, my sisters and brothers. It’s what we’re about.