This autumn, I’m slowing down. I’m watching the leaves fall

Thirty years ago, autumn skipped right over my little corner of New England. It started with a September injury. I was moving a heavy table at work, twisted just the wrong way, and felt an inglorious yank in my back. Concerned it might be a torn muscle, I got an X-ray. “No big deal,” I thought. I was 22 years old and confident in my immortality — at least until the radiology tech looked at the screen, paused and started to stammer. With wide eyes, he told me to see my doctor right away.

That very afternoon, I found myself in my general practitioner’s office, where I saw with my own eyes what the X-ray had revealed: a tumor. It was big, it was nasty and it was growing onto, and into, my spine. Even the doctor seemed shocked at the scope of it. He was also shocked that we had found it at all. If not for the furniture-moving mishap, the fast-growing tumor would probably have been discovered too late for us to do much about it. It would have infiltrated and irreversibly damaged the spine, leading to possible paralysis. Or worse. And depending upon what kind of tumor it was, “worse” was definitely still on the table.

We wouldn’t know for sure until the surgery — a difficult, complicated procedure that was still a month away. The surgeons gave no guarantees that they could safely remove the invader. They also warned me that yet-undiscovered havoc might be lurking just out of sight. Until then, I could only wait and wonder.

And panic.

As the weather cooled, I spent the month saying my goodbyes … if only in my head. I wrote letters of farewell to loved ones, then hid them to be discovered at a later date. I threw a “tumor party” in a lame attempt to make light of a dark situation. Taylor Swift songs aside, 22 is a fraught age. It’s complicated enough by new independence and Big Life Decisions without adding spine-strangling tumors, potential paralysis and a possibly looming cancer diagnosis into the mix.

I recovered in the quick and complete way that only young people can, and I went back to my normal life. Mostly.

The foliage was still bright green when my surgical date arrived. I went into the hospital for two long, supremely un-fun weeks, followed by more bed rest at home. And by the time I finally stepped back outside, the leaves were just  … gone. No oranges, no crimsons, no golds. I had missed the best part. Of course, it was hard to complain when the end result was nothing short of magical: The surgeons removed the tumor and declared that it was benign. One and (hopefully) done. I recovered in the quick and complete way that only young people can, and I went back to my normal life. Mostly.

In many ways, I was exactly the same person that I had been before. I still struggled to find the right haircut, still ordered takeout dumplings and still wandered through bookstores every chance I got. In the aftermath, however, each of these simple events felt like big events. Each otherwise boring day felt like a big day. After all, if I hadn’t moved that particular table at that particular moment in time, I might never again have had the opportunity to choose the haircut, eat the dumplings or stroll those bookshop aisles on my own two feet.

Every minute after that X-ray was a gift, pure and simple. A gift I couldn’t squander. And now, dammit, I was in a hurry.

Cue the overachieving. It started with two degrees and segued into various jobs in the nonprofit sector, where, presumably, I would be able to prove to myself that I was worth the second chance. Then on to journalism, where I earned awards, and motherhood, where I earned none. In my 40s, I started a nonprofit organization. I also organized field trips. Wrote a column for the newspaper. Led a Girl Scout troop. Tried (unsuccessfully) to become a gardener, a photographer and a contestant in the Pillsbury Bake-Off. And throughout it all, I pursued my lifelong goal of becoming a published author with the stubborn, bone-grating tenacity of "Jaws" chomping a '70s teenager. Every small achievement along the way was buttressed by countless more failures, rejections and criticisms, which I treated like mud in my path. Mud can drag you down, get you stuck. But it also washes off pretty well if you wear the right shoes.

[G]o, go, go. Do, do, do. Autumn leaves, shmautumn leaves. Who has time for that?

Did I take it too far? Possibly. Three decades later, I still find it hard to relax. Even on vacation, where there are too many experiences waiting to be experienced. Even on Sunday afternoons, when a clear calendar beckons with accomplishments waiting to be accomplished. In many ways, I became the quintessential American specimen: Go, go, go. Do, do, do. Autumn leaves, shmautumn leaves. Who has time for that?

When in doubt, I simply had to glance up at the Winston Churchill quote taped on the wall: “Never, never, never, never give up.” That quote has followed me from place to place for as long as I can remember. So you can imagine my surprise and horror to learn recently that Winston Churchill never actually said that at all. What he said, more specifically, was: “Never give in —never, never, never, never … except to convictions of honor and good sense.”

It's the “good sense” part that gets me.

How many other autumns have I missed, running around like the Little Engine that Shouldn’t? Ignoring the awe-inspiring beauty that was right in front of my perpetually distracted face? On some rational level, I know that no one is keeping this ridiculous score but me. No one would notice or care if I stopped checking boxes, if I just lived my life — my bonus life — and left it at that.

In the meantime, I have a milestone to mark. A tumor-versary? I don’t think they make a card for that, though you can certainly get anything written on a cake. Better yet, I could make up for lost time — and lost leaves — by lingering under the maple tree in my backyard, counting my mistakes and blessings with every falling dapple of yellow, orange and red.

While I’m at it, I think I’ll also hang a different sort of Churchill quote on my wall: “All the greatest things are simple.” The leaves make it look so easy. But if they can change, maybe I can, too.

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