Sports pages, magazine covers, ESPN and all its sub-stations, and sports radio talk show pundits are all talking or writing about football. One of our advertising sales people said to me yesterday that he is so pumped to see Clemson and USC football coverage dominating the sports section of the local daily paper. It's only July, but yes, it is football season.

While it is a little early, and still way too hot for me, I love football season. It conjures up for me cool weather, wearing sweatshirts, the smell of decomposing leaves and, yes, the can't-win-the-big-one-but-I-love-you-Philadelphia Eagles.

Many of us love the changing of the sports seasons as much as we love the changing of the weather seasons. Fall means football, soup, sweatshirts and falling leaves. Winter means basketball, wrestling, skiing, snow shoveling and cozy snuggling by the fire place. Spring ushers in flowers and baseball. And summer means hot weather, swimming, reading on the back porch, sunbathing at the beach and more baseball!

Reviewing some pages in my journal from this past winter, I found a reminder I wrote from a confidant who told me we all have different seasons in our lives. While I was stuggling through a personal issue that seemed to make me self-absorbed, of which I was very well aware and very uncomfortable with, she reminded me that it was simply a season of my life.

Back then, and again as I reviewed my writings, I was immediately drawn to Ecclesiastes 3, which contains a philosophical discourse on the meaning of life.

And to many readers of my generation, it is the verse that Kevin Bacon uses to convince the pastor of the town in Footloose that the kids should be able to dance: "To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven…"

Some seasons are winning seasons – ala the Phillies this baseball season, as they continue to dominate the much locally loved Atlanta Braves, who, after having many, many winning seasons, are struggling in the NL East. Similarly, the seasons of our lives might feel like winning or losing seasons, depending on our own particular circumstances.

But like the verse from Ecclesiastes suggests, the seasons of our lives change just like the weather and just like the fortunes of the Phillies, Braves and Eagles.

It's also good to remember that even in the midst of a losing season, there are some plays that do make the highlight reel.

Another great idea to remember about a losing season is contained in Pat Conroy's "My Losing Season." In writing the memoir of his losing 1966-67 basketball season as a point guard for The Citadel, Conroy wrote of the 7-18 record, "There is no downside to winning. It feels forever fabulous. But there is no teacher more discriminating or transforming than loss."

Here's to a winning season and, at the very least, an appreciation of finding meaning in the lessons learned from loss.

And there is always the highlight reel.