The change of seasons, states of heart & mindset

There's something about fall. Even in LA, where the seasons just feel like varying degrees of summer, there are indicators subtly pointing to the fact that, yes, fall is in the air. Scarves are suddenly available for purchase, football is once again on tv, some leaves drop from their trees knowing that the warm weather is only trying to to blind them to what nature has intended, the days insist on getting shorter and the nights get down right chilly.

So, even though the only football I've seen this season was viewed over margaritas during a Sunday afternoon happy hour in Santa Monica with Christine (also known as Sister, Sissy, Teen & favorite person in the world)...I had purchased a scarf that day (same one as Teen, of course), it was in October, and the sun was about to set all too soon. It may not have been raking leaves or picking my own apples, but it was about as seasonal as I was going to get.

Yes, fall is here. And, in most cases, fall is about to turn to winter, which only becomes a reality for me when I return to Minnesota for Christmas and that first gust of icy wind slaps me across the face in the airport parking lot.

Whatever it is about the fall season, it always makes me reflective. It is always my most introverted time of year. I'll drive home without the radio on - just me and my neurotic thoughts coasting along in the golden glow of late afternoon. I'll happily burrow into a sweater, jeans and my beloved flip flops and sit on a Starbucks patio sipping a soy chai for hours on a Sunday afternoon - just me, my book, my journal and the breeze rustling through the palm trees.

What I still haven't figured out is this: is all this reflecting what makes me miss those select friends with hearts of gold, or do I miss them most at this time of year because they are so far away from me, and with all this introvertedness I've made myself a little lonely? Probably a bit of both, but whatever it is about fall, I find myself aching for the company of certain people.

Today, it hit me so hard I was practically in tears. I needed a big dose of Randell in my life. I was inexplicably sad and all I wanted was to turn back time 5 years and walk out of my room and upstairs to find Randell drinking a latte she'd made herself and watching TV in the living room we shared with our 4 other roommates. I spent more than half of my time in Boulder living with her and there is something about this girl that is just so...good. She has the mystical ability to be the nicest person in the world without also being a pushover. I don't know many people like that, do you?

So, after weeks of being "in a mood" I woke up today and desperately wanted something to change. And deep down my heart cried out for the friend I hadn't talked to in months. Randell's smiling friendship is like a blanket to wrap your soul in on a fall afternoon - cozy and safe, soothing and comforting - a good place to stay for a long time.

I got my soy chai, positioned the chair so the 4:00 sun would warm my face, dug my phone out of my bag, called my old roommate and felt my body breathe deep and relax at the sound of her excited, "Hey, Sar! I was just thinking about you today!"

Magic.

I don't know how she does it. (I also don't know how she teaches high school math, but that's another kind of mystery.) I don't know why I react to fall the way I do. And why it sometimes feels good to be melancholy, well, I don't know that either. I do know that I plan to keep Randell forever. We met at 18 and I hope that at 88 we're still running to the grocery store to buy a 4th of July sheet cake that we will bring home and eat on the living room floor with no plates, just 2 forks.

For the love of Randell

"No distance of place or lapse of time can lessen the friendship of those who are thoroughly persuaded of each other's worth." - Robert Southy