A Story of Overcoming Depression and Loss

Tagged A Story of Overcoming Depression and Loss

Why Leaves Change Colors: A Story of Hope

October 23rd, 2015 Learning Labs Consulting

“… You expected to be sad in the fall. Part of you died each year when the leaves fell from the trees and their branches were bare against the wind and the cold, wintry light. But you knew there would always be the spring, as you knew the river would flow again after it was frozen…”

― Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast

Fall is akin to the word bittersweet for me- beautiful yes, but also full of remembrance for what has become past. Each fall I am reminded of every fall before, and the last couple have been quite difficult. Fall signals the most tumultuous time in my marriage. It signals the beginnings of a slide into a wintery depression. Fall is the time when my grandmother Rose died last year.

Mel shared with me an insight about fall, however, that has somewhat affected the way I perceive the season. Her insight was confirmed with a search that revealed this article about the changing colors of leaves in the fall:

The story begins in summer, when leaves are green thanks to a pigment known as chlorophyll. It captures just the right spectrum of color from the sun’s light, to power the process known as photosynthesis. “As the chlorophyll is grabbing that sunlight, it’s pulling water from the soil and carbon dioxide from the air and energy from the sunlight and shoving it together to make sugar,” Sutherland says. That helps the tree blossom and grow. As the days grow shorter in autumn, leaves stop making chlorophyll, revealing a dazzling secret.

The secret is that the colors of fall are the leaves true colors.