To Begin As We Mean To Go On

There is a little color mixed in with the still-vivid green of my suburban trees, the air is starting to get cold, and getting around Manhattan is a veritable nightmare because the UN General Assembly is in town, along with its secret service agents, motorcades, and roadblocks. Not being a fan of pumpkin spice lattes - blasphemy, I know - these are my most obvious signs that fall has arrived.

Long my favorite season, I have had some reservations this year about the melting of summer into fall, but now that it's here, I'm ready to embrace it in all of its spicy, crispy aired glory.

Another sign of the coming of fall is that beginning tomorrow night, we celebrate the Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashanah, which is the first of four successive weeks of holidays, the most important and holiest month of the Jewish calendar.

Tomorrow morning we are driving to Pittsburgh to spend this holiday with family, and tomorrow night, as the sun sets, I will light candles with my mom and with Sister K, and we will welcome these weeks, ready to observe and to come out the other side of the month eager to start again, to begin as we mean to go on.

As I wrote last year around this time, these are family times, times of reflection, and times of celebration.

Wishing everyone who celebrates a shana tova, a meaningful holiday, and a sweet new year.