We are straddling summer and fall right now in Tallahassee. The days are getting shorter and the early morning temperatures have gotten decidedly cooler, but by 11:00 am, the summer heat returns and lasts through the evening. My backyard is a greenish-brown testimony to this funky between-the-seasons dissonance. The summer flowers and vegetables that haven’t already wilted are hanging on by a thread. Fall plants are still dormant, waiting until it’s safe to bloom.

I am anxious to turn the corner on summer, and I wish fall would hurry up and make a cool and colorful entrance. I know transitions are a natural and inevitable part of human life and plant life, but I have a bad habit of trying to skip over difficult or colorless transitions so I can get to the next phase – the highlights. I will plant seeds before the soil has had time to be rejuvenated because I don’t like looking at empty dirt. I focus on “just getting through this week” so I can fast forward to a less stressful time – without stopping to deal with the things that caused the stress.

Transitions may be transient, but they matter. They are critical bridges to the next chapter – in a garden, a relationship, a career, a recovery – and I struggle to appreciate those in-between times as much as I appreciate the more colorful, productive times before and after. As King Solomon wisely wrote, “There is a time for everything” – which means every moment should have a purpose.

I was reminded of that truth at a local middle school cross country meet this week. I was the “sweeper” for the girls’ and boys’ races. My job was to ride my bike on the course behind the last runners to make sure they made it safely to the finish line. I’ve done this job for many years, and it is always a struggle, because the last runners seem so discouraged as they make their way over the 3-kilometer course. My cheerful words of encouragement are usually met with blank stares. And I don’t blame them – I am just a loud woman on a bicycle trying to get them to do something they don’t want to do!

The girls’ started first and within the first few hundred yards, I knew who I would be hanging out with for the rest of the race. She started walking almost immediately and it was painful to watch her grimace dejectedly the rest of the way.

When I started off on my bike at the back of the boys’ race, I braced myself for another slow, difficult slog.

But this race was different. The lead runners took off in a flash and the field quickly snaked into a long line that narrowed to one or two runners at the very back. Several boys started walking as soon as they were out of sight of the coaches, except for one. I will call him “E”.

E wasn’t walking, he was running. His gait was slow and labored, but he never stopped “running”. I encouraged him to try and pass the two boys who were walking ahead of him, but he was content to keep his own pace – slow, steady and determined.

The second half of the race was out-and-back, so the faster runners passed the slower runners on their way to the finish line. I worried that E might be discouraged to see the other boys so far ahead of him. Nope. Whenever he spotted a runner from his middle school team, he looked up at them said “Good job”. And then he continued to move along the route at the same steady pace, his heavy breathing and sweat-drenched forehead proof of the effort it cost him.

With about a half mile to go, E told me his best time for a 3-kilometer run was 36 minutes. He was hoping to run a new personal best today. I realized at that moment he wasn’t racing against the other boys. He was running his own race. He had set a personal goal, and he was determined to achieve it. Slowly, steadily and with uncommon focus.

As we headed toward finish line, where the teams and spectators were gathered on the grass, his teammates began shouting his name. He was the last finisher – by a long distance – but his teammates cheered for him as if he were an Olympic champion and they ran in a parade behind him to the finish chute. It was obvious E had earned their respect and admiration off the playing field.

I had to get off my bike before the finish because I couldn’t see through the tears that were welling up in my eyes. I looked up and the clock said 29:15. He had taken 7 minutes off his best time.

He was the last finisher, he didn’t score for his team (in a cross-country meet, only the top five finisher score for a team) but E courageously rose to the moment and left nothing out on that course. He turned last place into first place – and showed me that every moment is an opportunity. Even the transitions.

“What do workers gain from their toil? I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race. He has made everything beautiful in its time.”

Ecclesiastes 3:9-11