August signals the beginning of school for kids in our area.  The state fair is the coming attraction.  Meteor showers awe us with a light show.  And the days of summer stretch long.  But too soon they are over.  I feel fall in the air.

Sweet William and I have enjoyed some long summer days this year with our three grandchildren who live away, our dear ones.  It was a dream to have them for an extended visit.  This year the dream came true, that prayer answered with “yes.”

They are a busy bunch with friends and family to visit.  So many nights they were scattered hither and yon, sleeping at someone else’s house.  So on the days and nights when they all converge together at the Wright House, we relish the moments.

Time is the gift we are given, to share moments, days, weeks with one another.  Time waits for no one.  How quickly we can let it slip without doing what is important or saying the words we need to say.

Because visits with our grands are few and far between in this season of our lives, perhaps we can see more clearly  the value of moments together.  Perhaps we speak words that build up and bite our tongues so as not to hurt or offend.  Perhaps we pick our battles carefully and realize what is important.

Perhaps we seize the day to plant faith, hope, and love into tender hearts so the seeds will take root and grow, so they will remember and find comfort in difficulty.

Gentle good mornings and tender good nights and hugs and kisses and endearments are the goal for this fleeting time.

But why shouldn’t it be that way always?  With people I see every day, with those in my circle of influence, shouldn’t my attitude and actions be just as carefully planned to show the greatest love and respect for each individual?

I say yes, but it is not always that easy.  If absence makes the heart grow fonder, then does common everyday presence make me complacent and lazy?  I say yes, it does.  But it shouldn’t.

Some lessons are learned in the long days of summer.  Lessons that I should take into fall, winter, and spring.

I will never understand why things happen the way they do, why God moves in such mysterious ways past finding out.  I think I only frustrate myself by continuing to search for the reason and rhyme of His doings.

What I can know with surety is that He sets before me a high calling.  It is a calling to love, to do the right thing, to walk in integrity, to live like the long days of summer will not last.

Because they soon slip away.