It is beneficial to reflect on our past seasons of life insomuch as we can apply the learning to our present season, and perhaps share insights from our glories and goof-ups with younger women friends. It is also useful to anticipate the opportunities and challenges of future seasons to be as prepared as possible. A good measure of optimism is helpful here, especially from my vantage point of looking toward the last quarter of life. Health issues? Financial challenges? And possible widowhood with its loneliness and hard work of finding a new normal.

But the greatest fulfillment in life is found by the woman whose primary occupation is with the present season. She notices the sights sounds, tastes, smells and textures all around her. She is attentive and responsive to the people around her as well as to the Spirit within her. She is grateful for the big and the little blessings each day offers. She suffers well in times of trouble, her faith and hope anchored securely in her good God. She is the woman I aspire to be, praised in scripture as noble.

Proverbs 31:25 – “She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come.”

In my final days on this earthly sojourn, I hope I can say, along with poet Mary Oliver:

“When it’s over, I want to say all my life

I was a bride married to amazement.

I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it’s over, I don’t want to wonder

if I have made of my life something particular, and real.

I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened,

or full of argument.

I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.”

(“When Death Comes”)