I felt it this week when I pulled on my teal Columbia fleece jacket for our morning walk. I noticed it in the cluster of red leaves at the top of the Maple tree on the corner and the baskets of Zestar apples (my favorite) at the farmer's market.

And then Wegmans had a sample of cornbread with hot honey on Saturday morning and all I could think about was a big bowl of Taco Soup and weekend football games (Go Dawgs! Go Bills! 🏈).

Fall is here and with it, a return to work and school rhythms, academic calendars, Gilmore Girls (IYKYK), and pumpkin-spiced-everything.

The Olympics Primetime coverage has been a nightly ritual in our house these past few weeks—the Women’s 1500m Freestyle (go, Katie Ledecky!), the Men’s pommel horse routines (go, Stephen Nedoroscik!), and of course, Women’s Gymnastics (go, Simone Biles and Suni Lee!).

All of it is impressive—the vault, the floor routines, the high bars—but the balance beam routine takes me right back to grade-school gymnastics classes…

SCENE: World of Gymnastics, Thursday afternoon class, early 1990s

I'm wearing a light pink leotard with silver polka dots. I stare down at my bare feet on the blue mat, then peer around the shoulders of my classmates ahead of me in line to see a camel-brown balance beam that's taller than I am. 

Today, we're doing cartwheels on the balance beam.

Last week, we celebrated Independence Day here in the U.S. 🇺🇸

We went canoeing with Rory, I made a red, white, and blue charcuterie platter, and we reflected on the meaning of freedom, democracy, and independence and how this plays into our work as musicians and teachers.

And that led me to Benjamin Franklin. 

Franklin was a Founding Father of the United States, signing the Declaration of Independence, the Treaty of Paris, and the U.S. Constitution. There's also the famous story of flying a kite in a thunderstorm with a key attached to test his theory of electricity. 🔑

But it turns out there's a lot more to learn.