November Roses

My husband and I took a short trip last week to the Arkansas Ozarks to see the leaves.  And I must say the trip was well worth it.  The weather was perfect and the fall colors were beautiful. When we returned home I went into the back yard to check my garden and found I had several late blooming roses.  They stood out in stark contrast to the rest of the flowers in the garden that had begun to look like their blooming lives were over.  Monday morning I took a pair of garden scissors and cut several roses for the house, at least a dozen blooms.  Red and yellow and pink.  The yellow and pink ones went into a vase in  the master bathroom and the red ones graced the grate room.  And they seemed so beautiful and precious because I realized they could very well be the last ones this year.
November roses are so different from the ones you gather in May.  In May you have the hope of many more to come through the summer months.  They look the same and yet they are different.  More precious, more rare; you realize there won't be more for several months and so you have an added appreciation for them. And I couldn't help but think this was so true of so many things in life.  So often we fail to appreciate them until they are almost over.  It's like getting to the bottom of the symbolic bottle and suddenly realizing there is not going to be any more.
I have noticed some people who have children later in life.  It seems like in so many cases there is a renewed desire to savor the experience, to fully appreciate what they have, as opposed to those who have parenthood thrust on them at an early age.  So often the young are still kids themselves, still needing to play and not quite up to the challenge of assuming responsibility for another life, especially one that is totally helpless and dependant on them.  They expect too much from their kids in many cases, whereas those that are older have come to realize kids are just that; kids. 
The same is true of life itself.  As we come to terms with our own mortality, we really begin to appreciate what we have.  Somehow or other, life just becomes more precious.  We begin to realize there may not be so many other days.  A quietness settles in.  A desire to look more closely at the roses of November.  To appreciate more their color and fragrance. And a thankfulness that even thought it's deep in November there is still beauty to be had and roses to gather.