So much love it's holy.
September always brings that mix of excitement and anticipation, doesn't it? How is it already fall?
On one hand, those with young people around us and the teachers have lunchboxes, fresh notebooks, and new routines. But this year feels different for me. For the first time in over 20 years, I don't have a kid starting school.
My own back-to-school fix came through checking on nieces and nephews, spending time with a chosen family friend and her kids navigating the return to school, and celebrating with new dance shoes for my City College enrollment (so much joy!). Teaching my first course at Emory on purpose, well-being, and impact filled my heart in ways I didn't expect.
Talking with a parent newly navigating single parenthood and school chaos, I shared something real: I cried on the first and last day of school every single year. Those tears were equal parts nostalgia and overwhelm—mourning what was while juggling impossible schedules. And yet it always worked out, thanks to the village surrounding us.
If you're feeling the weight of these times, you're not alone. I've written about navigating these big transitions before, and these pieces might speak to where you are:
"Feelings are nouns. There is so much space. This is the end." - A narrative meditation on empty nest life and the "collective noun for feelings that erupt following the missing of a singular devotion."
"Letting go. Holding tight." - The story of college drop-off, finding "love's Mount Everest," and a stranger named Nathan who reminded me we're always lucky.
Here's what I know about September transitions: they're opportunities to recommit to what matters most. While I don't have a kid school calendar to chart the rest of my year, I am pausing to consider what I want to accomplish in the final 100 or so days of this year.
I want so much love it's holy.
And I know to experience that much love, I will recommit to my practices of giving and noticing. Being a (not so) secret agent of love feels more important than ever in our ever-uncertain and divided world. Grounding in my practices of giving and receiving love are what allow me to have hope for, to imagine, a different future.
Without my own young people to tend to at the start of this learning year, I'm finding new ways to spread love. I've returned to carrying the original LoveYou2 flier and posting it on bulletin boards at City College. It's my small act of resistance against a world that sometimes feels too harsh for our tender hearts.
Your mundane mission, should you choose to accept it: Leave a proof of love somewhere unexpected this week. A note in a library book. A message on a community board. A text to someone who could use encouragement. When the world feels divided, we become the bridge builders, one small act at a time.
Keep going, secret agents. The world needs your love now more than ever.