May is one of my favorite months. It has the best weather, not too hot/not too cold. The tentative, earliest green has matured and the apple blossoms and all the sweet scented flowers I love best (lilacs and lilies of the valley) run riot in an celebration of fragrance and color.

May doesn’t last, of course. I mourn when I see the blossoms fall in heedless heaps, turn brown and wither away; when the gentle warmth gives way to heat; and when the now deep green leaves offer reluctant respite from the hot, sweltering days that follow.

Recently two dear friends decided to relocate-one to Philadelphia and the other to the desert city of Phoenix. One left just before blossom-time reached its peak, and the other is leaving this week, just past peak.

I will miss both of them, of course, but the timing is right. I’ve watched them let go of struggles, relationships, jobs, and possessions, in a very conscious way. They’re both more than ready for their next life chapter.

Their blossoming in this place is done. Whatever the future holds, they aren’t holding on, except in memory, to those blossoms faded in time and pressed between the pages of the past.

Like all of life, nothing is permanent, except what we choose to hold onto.

What blossoms, however beautiful, could you release to embrace what is becoming available? What present do you want to inhabit? What present can you give yourself?

May we pursue our paths, reveling in what we love, and releasing it when it fulfills its purpose,

Best wishes,

Elizabeth