Leaves are changing color and holding on for dear life. I saw many of them spinning on their limbs this afternoon. They are certain that they must not let go…they have been holding on since spring…and what comes next. As I sit writing this on the Writing Porch…I see that the leaves on my neighbors tree have changed their color overnight.

October is my month. I was born on October the 24th, 1957. When I was a child I had some difficulty remembering just which year in the 1950’s that I had been born. At times I thought that the year was 1956…while on other occasions it seemed like that it was 1958. These days when I fill out a digital form that requires that I submit my date of birth and the year that I was born…I have to scroll….and scroll…and scroll. Halloween was a fun time in the early 1960’s. I loved the old monsters of filmdom, Frankenstein and Dracula and the Wolf Man and the Mummy. I purchased monster model kits at the Ben Franklin Dime Store and put them together and hand painted the creatures. The Dime Store had many model car kits and a few monster kits. The Eldorado Ben Franklin Store seemed to have a bit of everything…and yet it was not a large store.

Presidential campaigns are hard fought in the closing days of October…prior to election day on the first Tuesday of November. Almost every election cycle we hear the media speak of the threat of an, ‘October Surprise,’ where one or the other of the two primary contenders reveal a last minute negative news item on their opponent. In my thoughts I think our October Surprise this year can be that we live in a divided country…but we do not have to be divided. We can make a conscientious decision that although everyone around us is giving into the temptation to be prejudiced and biased and to believe that political parties are inextricably linked to faith…we can resist and reach out our hand to our neighbor and embody…peace…