Falling in Place

It didn't occur to me until it smacked me right in the face. Isn't that what Labor Day is all about for me? Falling into place? Literally, as fall is on our doorstep, and figuratively as I begin to reorganize my, and our, lives to accommodate the demands that each fall brings?

Today is a rainy, cool, kind of icky day. It is lovely, really. Sometimes a hot, sunny, beautiful Labor Day reminds me of all I will miss as summer ends. And we did have such a wonderful one, filled with all the things I love; fun, family, friends, food, travel, love, sun, sand, water. Still, a rainy day signifies an end to me. Sure, September will have some gloriously Indian Summer days, but summer, today, is done.

Our goodbye to summer was up at camp. We had a wonderful few days in the St. Lawrence this past weekend. Then, on our way home through Watertown, we stopped at the mall, and their closing Borders store. (woohoo!) I picked up a bunch of books, thinking how great it was to be stocking up on some reading to take me through the fall. One, the one pictured above, though, is a sign. I am not sure what it is supposed to be telling me, but it is a sign for sure, of things to come.

The store we were at was liquidating, so what you found was what you found. I tracked down a book my sister in law is going to love, which I will save as a gift. I found a book that has been on my amazon wish list for a long time. I found Paul Reiser has written yet another installment, Parenthood. Then I found this.

Anne Beattie has been "on my list" for years...and when I say years, I do mean years. When I started school in Lansing, in 8th grade, in the fall, when I felt like an out of place freak, transplanted from the suburbs to the country, my teacher, for some reason, sent me to a two day creative writing class up at BOCES. Other kids went too, but I knew no one, and really just hung out on the perimeter for those two days, absorbing myself in whatever I was writing at the time, that I so wish I still had, now. Little stands out for me, but I do CLEARLY recall the teacher, some Cornell grad student, talking to me, and recommending that I read a book, more specifically, Falling In Place by Ann Beattie...

I do not know why.
I do not know her work at all.
I do not know what the book is about.

Some day I will read it, I guess.

But this book presented itself to me...amongst the stacks and stacks of books being sold for a deep, deep discount. A collection of her stories from The New Yorker...short stories...perfect for fall...when "me" time goes out the window for a while. Fall is here, and I look forward to it. To new beginnings. To rich autumnal hues. To crisp cool clear nights. To wine. To pumpkins.

Yes, summer, I will miss you, but today, I'm falling in place.