Everything has its own season

Every year, I look forward to the fringe tree blooming in our front yard. Its white, fleecy feathers hang from the branches and dance in the wind. Along with the gorgeous pink weeping cherry tree that blooms a few weeks before, it’s one of my favorite spring-flowering trees. The dogwood, saucer magnolia and Bradford pear can’t beat its beauty.

Check out my books

The other night, a wicked storm rolled into town. The wind whipped, pea-sized hail fell and a torrential downpour soaked the ground. When I walked outside the following morning, the fringe tree was naked, and its soft billowy blooms blanketed the ground. All that beauty gone in a flash, ripped from the branches before I was ready to say goodbye.
As I picked up some soggy blooms and held them in the palm of my hand, tears pooled in my eyes. I was reminded of beauty cut short, of parents and family and friends, tassels torn too soon from the tree of life during one of life’s raging storms.
Why must things die? a young child asks, unable to understand that all life is organized in such a way that it has a limited lifespan.
Flies might live for days, tortoises and whales for hundreds of years and trees for thousands of years. But eventually, they all die. No living thing, no animal or plant, can escape death.
So often in life we witness beauty too short-lived. Why can’t the fringes hang forever? Why do the cherry blossoms fade and fall?
What perhaps we should be asking is, Why didn’t I enjoy the beauty when I had the chance?
It’s human nature, I think, to believe there will always be another day. But sometimes there isn’t. Sometimes wicked weather slams us unexpectedly and we’re caught off-guard, standing in the drenching rain and rising water.

Dreams: Don't give up on you

Dreams. Most of us have them, but how many of us achieve them? “Achieve them?” you ask. “Don’t dreams just happen? Isn’t that why we call them dreams?”

No, most dreams just don’t happen. They take work. Lots of work. I can dream that I want to write a book or run a race, but if I never start writing or never start running, those dreams will never materialize.

Since it’s the season of mortar boards and tassels, I thought it timely to talk about dreams.

Dreams are life’s sugar. They sweeten it and make even the darkest days more palatable. But nothing compares to achieving them. To hold that book in your hand or to cross that finish line — WOW! It’s an incredible feeling.

Read more

What I would tell graduates today

It’s been, um, decades since I graduated from high school, but I still remember my graduation speech.

I wrote about a tree, using it as a metaphor for life. Just thinking about it makes me yawn.

B-O-R-I-N-G.

If I could go back in time, here’s what I’d say.

1. Work hard. This might seem like a no-brainer, but plenty of people break from the gate too slowly and never catch up to the pack. Just because you’ve worked hard for more than a decade doesn’t mean you get to slack off for the next four years.

I know, I know. It’s not what you want to hear. But believe me when I tell you that too many people make this mistake and regret it later. It’s not easy bringing up a GPA that you tanked your first year in college; so don’t tank it.

Read the rest