OT: F is for Fall

Today is September 1st which means the unofficial start to fall is upon us. Kids are getting ready to go back to school, the enormous September edition of magazines are adorning check-out line shelves everywhere, and Starbuck's has begun serving all things pumpkin spice. I have to say that I have had just about enough of the humidity and beach-seeking tourists that summer brings and am excited about the inevitableness that is fall...

...but I am also a little nervous.

Fall will be the first season of my life in recent memory that I enter alone. No longer do I have a co-pilot with whom I can plan October adventures with or make homemade soup for. For this fall, at least, I must say goodbye to apple picking dates and tailgating partners. Like these, there are so many more events and items and habits that I didn't realize are deeply connected with memories until I was forced to realize that the memories I was thinking of are the last of their kind...until someone comes along with whom I am willing and excited to make new memories with.

As the whole world knows (unless you are of course living under a rock), the football pre-season has already begun. Football is something I've never hated but never loved either. I don't mind watching the game, especially when watching with someone who does love it. I have even gotten attached to a certain team over the past few years and have developed a mediocre understanding of how the game is played (thanks to a lot of patience and invisible play drawings on the couch involving various x's and o's and arrows).

To my immense surprise, I flicked on my tv the other night to be greeted by an NFL game and a simultaneous (and unexpected) pang in my stomach:

It is already fall. I have been on my own for two months. And what the heck am I going to do about my football team?!

I resigned myself to the fact that I will have to find a new football team, one with no strings attached. I remembered that my mom's family is from Pittsburgh and that they are all serious Steelers fans, and it was decided in an instant that I would become one too. So that's settled.

Before June, I used to think I was a strong person. I thought that I could do anything I set my mind on. The past two weeks have made me realize that the pre-June me was nothing compared to what I am now. I am amazed at how I've grown and adapted in such a short amount of time. The human element truly is amazing and resilient and can be pushed to the limit without breaking but instead becoming something new and evolved and better. I am thankful for what I have, what I am capable of, and the turn my life has taken for I know it will make me a stronger, better person in the end. I can feel it already.

So with the onslaught of all things fall, I am apprehensive but excited and curious. I have faith in myself (which, coincidentally, is another thing F could stand for). I will also be taking applications for temporary partner-in-crime/pumpkin spice enthusiast. Preferably of the platonic kind. If you're interested, you know where to find me.