June and July blew through like giddy old friends from out of town. And they made our house feel like home for a while, shared their beautiful memory-making stories. And some heartbreaking, life-changing ones, too. It has been a fast summer, and I don’t want to let go too soon. But today is August.

I do crazy things in August, things like pull out fall smelling candles and start to make soup. I’d like to think I’ve gotten better at not rushing ahead to the next season, and maybe I have in some ways. But this year, I can feel that familiar pull towards autumn, that new shoes and pencils itch, a longing for a schedule that school days brings, hope for a cool blast of air. I should know better, living in North Carolina.We don’t get fall until October. Still, August comes in like a maid and readys the house and all her tenets for the transition. She sweeps under the couch and taps your crossed feet off the coffee table, and as she wipes the surface clean, she whispers Get ready, sweetheart. Change is coming.

Aren’t you thankful for times of transition? We have a Maker who doesn’t just throw the sun up into the sky in a shock of fire, but pulls it up slow every morning and down the same way every night. And if you stare as it happens, the change is hard to see, but if you close your eyes and count to twenty, everything is different when you open them back up again. It’s because a lot happens in the transition, secret things, beautiful things, Spirit led things.

And so I wait for the book to release in a few short weeks, and ask for the Lord to calm me. We look forward to school starting up again, and place any anxiety about it in his hands. I sit with The Man with calendars and fall schedules, and quietly celebrate what every future meeting and event means: that we are living, that we are doing what we love, and that we belong to a community. Prepare us, O Lord, in this month of transition.

How do you feel about August?