The Autumn Equinox has just passed and we are officially in the delightful fall season.  The leaves are beginning to turn and the garden is shutting down.  I’m making small stabs at fall cleaning as the crisper air gives me more energy.  Note the “small” and “stabs”.  Today the rains are pelting down and there is no crispness to the air --- but that is typical for the turning of the season.

Happy Anniversary to Shawn and Kristen!  Their wedding, a few years ago, was a fine day in the park where they were married.  I remember the trays of cookies we made for the reception, and our then very-small granddaughter dancing with her father and feeling quite grown-up.  I remember the bride dancing with one of her very rural clients who was shy and new to a dance floor but had a big smile.  I remember a massage-therapist cousin working out a “crick” in the groom’s neck.  The newly-wed couple then left on an unforgettable journey to Australia and New Zealand where spring was coming instead of the autumn of our hemisphere.

Our anniversary is earlier in September, with a lot more years behind it.  I’ve written about this before, but it is fun to recall.  We were married on Labor Day weekend; Kerm had to extricate himself from the NYS Fair (he was a 4-H Extension Agent) in order to collect himself and his clothing for the evening candle-light service in the church where I grew up.  The reception, held in the church social room, was attended by a crowd of family and friends.  Simple as the event was, our friends of that era are still talking about it when we get together.  This is because a number of them decided that since we wouldn’t be around for a traditional shivaree*, they’d “accompany” us on our way.  That quickly thrown-together prank became a car chase --- not high-speed --- our borrowed car that had trouble revving up to 55 mph.** But it did involve some outraged Victor citizens when a car following us went roaring over someone’s lawn and another car full of riotous young people stopped to ask for directions.  I understand they were met at the door with a shot gun in the hands of an annoyed resident.  We finally ditched (not literally) our entourage by entering the NYS Thruway; our friends were all too cost-conscious to go and do likewise.  We emerged at the next exit, drove to where we had hidden our car in my brother’s corn field, went to a friend’s home to grab suitcases, returned our get-away car to its owner and set off for New England.

Memories can be wonderful; they remind us of laughter, of fun times and, often, they bring us quiet joy in the midst of grief and losses.  Memories help us to know that bad times won’t last; as a Persian king engraved on his seal ring: “This too shall pass”.   Memories may keep us balanced as we recall so much good and so little bad.   The down-side of memories is the imprint of trauma.  No one wishes to endure horrors that pop up again and again, even though it might be something that will, eventually, be healed or even be useful in some way.   Trauma is an affliction that probably needs professional help to find meaning or freedom from what is a destructive memory.

Even with memorable reminders that life is generally good, it is easy to fall prey to discouragement, anxiety and fear.  Because life is unsettled ----like the weather ---- we also tend to be unsettled.

There seems to be, in fact, a wide-spread epidemic of anxiety across this land.   Anxiety grows like a weed in our mental garden.   We feel trepidation about aging, tremble at the unknown, have concern about what might happen with the world, fear that a bad experience might be repeated.   We won’t call a doctor because we fear what he/she might tell us.  We are reluctant to loosen our hold as our growing kids show signs of independence.  We are wary about a whole world of people who come from what we consider alien cultures who look and speak differently than we do.  Who knows what unwelcome changes they might bring?  In our anxiety, we tend to make generalizations about whole groups of people.  The less knowledge and experience we’ve had outside our own circles, the more we fear what we don’t know.  Shakespeare***, that poet and creator of plays, said “Fear is a worse pain than the pain we fear.”  And this is absolutely true.

A personal story: One night, a lot of years ago, one of our young adult sons wasn’t home when I thought he ought to be.  I hadn’t heard him come in and his car wasn’t in the driveway.  I had gone to bed, but kept getting up and pacing the floor --- stewing and worrying until my anxiety level was about 150 on a scale of one to ten.  He had to be at work early the next day and, as only mothers can, I visualized all sorts of terrible possibilities.  About 2 AM I was contemplating dire action when, during my pacing from living room to kitchen, I stumbled over his size 10 sneakers. While I was pacing the floor and losing sleep, he was peacefully slumbering in his room.  That is the sort of anxiety that we humans manufacture from the barest of materials.  We do this with our kids, with our marriages, with community issues, with people we don’t know, and with world events.   Joan Borysenko**** calls it “awfulizing”.  I excel at it!

It is also unreasonable fear and anxiety that drives prejudice and racism.   Earlier in civilization, in tribal societies, a stranger was generally regarded as an enemy.  Even though we are no longer actually tribal, tribalism seems to linger in our very genes; it has become rampant nationalism.  We distrust what we don’t understand, which is usually anyone who thinks differently than we do.  Of course, once any one of us gets to know any other person, we find much in common and fear flies out the window.  The more we emerge from our comfy little circles of safe friends and family, the more wonderful people we find.  And we realize that we share many of the same thoughts, hopes and need for community.

There is an upside to fear; it often is a warning, keeping us safe.  We teach a small child to fear touching a hot grill --- for good reason.   And, unfortunately, there are people who are the hot grill type, with whom we need to be wary.  We know that in spite of much good in the world, there is also evil.  In a very good book, The Gift of Fear*****, written by Gavin de Becker, he says, “follow your gut feeling”.  If you are uncomfortable about getting into an elevator with someone, DON’T.  Don’t walk in dark streets alone at night.  Don’t enter a parking garage alone at night.  Don’t put yourself where there is a valid possibility of danger.  This is situational fear and not the pervasive mind-fogging anxiety.  Be wise and be alert, but try not to be paranoid.    The tenuous path between regard for safety and being always fearful, takes wisdom and clarity of thought.

Finding a solution for the general anxiety that plagues us is not easy.  If you are someone who follows the Judeo-Christian beliefs, the Bible is full to over-flowing with words like “Trust” “Be not afraid”, Peace be with you!”.  Other philosophies suggest action: deep breathing exercises, tapping, and meditation.  And all of these things probably do lower our tendency to awfulize and may bring us back from the brink of panic.  But eventually, it is really our own awareness of the problem and what we decide, that will diminish our personal anxiety.  We must make a choice to either assume that we were meant to direct the world all by ourselves and so have every right to be anxious ---- or not.  If not, then we will try to do what we feel led to do, relax and trust that the universe is not going to fly apart on us.   

I began this reflection with two weddings.  Weddings are rites of hope; events that say we believe love will win out.  Anxiety for the world is submerged in the love around a wedding.  Kerm and I feel that our lives have been full to over-flowing with amazing experiences that now are part of our memory banks.  I couldn’t even begin to list the wonderful people we’ve known and know, the potential and occasionally real disasters that we’ve survived, the fun and laughter filling our days and the times that we’ve gone in new, slightly scary directions together.  And life being what it is, we have wept together, in times of loss and sadness.  All of these memorable things help us to keep on keeping on.

Reminders really do help, and there are many ways to keep memories in a rapid-recall mode.  I’m a hands-on person, so I make albums composed of photos, appropriate text, cartoons that apply, etc.  I keep framed pictures where I can see them.  Others who like a more up-to-date and tidy approach can keep an entire album, photos, and documents on a computer stick, to be accessed on screen whenever needed.  Journaling or collage are also ways to keep memories.  New experiences add textured layers in our mental memory banks.

So store up memories in the next few weeks of color, crisp apples, football games and mulled cider.  Autumn is both a now experience and will also provide memories to warm and lighten the winter months.

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Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.

*Shivaree------ an old custom--- also called a “horning” ---- of neighborhood friends, using cow bells and cymbals to wake up a newly-wed couple in the middle of the night --- and then demanding refreshment and conversation.  In some rural areas there were less savory customs such as stealing the bride.

**Sorry Jim, but your car really didn’t go over 55 mph!

***Shakespeare ---Renowned English poet, playwright and actor of the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods.  1564-1616.

****Joan Borysenko, PhD ---One of the world’s leading experts in stress and the mind-body connection.  Writer and speaker.

*****The Gift of Fear by Gavin De Becker---recognized as one of the world’s leading experts in protecting public figures.