On Autumn and Aging

While I was taking a picture of a new design for my client, I noticed the beauty of a pressed maple leaf that my Dud sent me from the States. You see, every fall season in the US, I ask my Dud to send me maple leaves (pressed between pages of a magazine) for my invitations! The first time he did that was when he was at Central Park in New York. He told me that he got some stares from the people around, maybe wondering if he's crazy or having Alzheimer's! I was touched by his experience because he did that for me even if people thought he was crazy. :) Behind that maple leaf, is my father's love for me and his support to my sometimes-crazy ideas.

But yesterday, a different thought crossed my mind. As I look at color of the maple leaf, I began to think about aging in people. Our youth is as vibrant as the green leaves of a maple tree in spring. But as we age, the color of our lives become richer just as the maple leaves turn to a shade of yellow to orange to brown and deep red. It may not be full of energy as the green leaf but the changing shades represent the phases in life that we go through.

By autumn, these leaves will eventually fall just like when we reach our old age, our body will deteriorate. But it doesn't end there...by this time, the color of a maple leaf is deeper and that makes autumn, autumn just as our lives are now richer, deeper and as colorful as the autumn leaves.