August, die she must

So a new month is here.

August has arrived and with it comes the ending of summer and the promise of fall --- colored leaves, football, cooler temperatures and yet another transition.

Once again it seems the summer has come and gone and I've somehow managed to miss it. Sad, isn't it, that we spend so much time hurrying about in our hectic lives that we rarely stop to smell the roses.

This has been a strange year for the grand old game of baseball. My favorite team, the Atlanta Braves, has managed to pull themselves out of an early season rut, marred by ineffective pitching and injuries, and now sit atop the NL East by a handful of games.

Regardless of what happens now, Braves manager Bobby Cox should be named NL Manager of the Year. He continues to expertly guide the Braves through the 162 games of the major league season, and is well on his way to garnering an unprecedented 13th consecutive division title. Not even the hated Yankees have ever done that.

This is a quiet week around the suburbs. Everybody's gone away --- I think most people have escaped to the beach or to the mountains for one last moment in the sun before summer passes for yet another year. How I envy them.

Several of my close friends have headed to Florida for the week, leaving me to face the end of summer alone. It's amazing as the days and weeks turn into years how much I realize I need my friends in my life. That can sometimes be an uncomfortable feeling --- realizing you aren't an island and that you need others in your life to bring joy and happiness.

Not that you don't want others in your life --- you just don't want to ever feel like you need them to the point of becoming a distraction. Funny how life works out that way.

So as summer begins to fade, my thoughts turn yet again to transitions: to the thing we all dread, but in the end the only thing that seems to remain: change.

Why is it we fear change so? Does anything, in the end, really ever stay constant? Even the stars in their courses eventually burn out.

Maybe that's why I enjoy baseball. It offers the illusion of consistency --- and I let it deceive me, year after year.