The Last of the Roses

This is an excerpt from the weekly News-Loveletter. If you would like it sent to your inbox directly (with all the other juicy bits, including a mini joy practice), you can add yourself to my mailing list here.

The Thanksgiving rose is its own kind of beautiful. Her leathery petals are nipped by frost. Her offerings are gathered by bees in the rarest form of celebration. She is a wonder.

But she's more than that. The rose who blooms these long nights of November will not stand down. Children stop to sniff, but her scent is faraway, like the long days of summer. The rose bows in reverence to what's lost, and still she perseveres.

A rose in autumn is an offering to our friends on the wing who make their living nosing through pollen and nectar. She startles the eye as the arms of trees emerge, all fawny pale and leafless.

The rose in autumn reminds us to don our bathing suits at all ages, to see our body as an instrument rather than an ornament (thank you, Lexie and Lindsay Kite).

Perfection is not in the flawless petal, but in showing up to play. Perfection is in being yourself. Some summer flowers bud in October. There's no turning back.

Today, I enjoy the roses around me, the roses within me, and the rose hips left behind on the stem. All of these are life, all are celebration, all are love.

When do you surrender to the love of what your body-being can do despite the odds? When do you set the optics aside to marvel in the strength, the willingness, and the perseverance that is you?