On Letting Go

Have you ever noticed that oak trees are always the last to lose their leaves? It’s true. Come mid-November, when all the other trees in the neighborhood stand naked and exposed, their bare branches stripped of every last leaf, the oak trees remain fully dressed in russet, their leaves scraping together in the wind like sandpaper. The oaks, it seems, have trouble letting go.

Turns out, I’m a lot like the oak tree that clings so fiercely to its leaves. In fact, I suspect a lot of us are.

We,...