Fall ritual leaves him ready for snow (11/28/07)

There's something about November.

Maybe it's because this is the month when I mark the passage of another year in my age, but mostly I think it's because of autumn itself. Late autumn, when the bright blue skies of October have disappeared and most of the brilliant color of the leaves has faded to a dirty brown.

Winter's in the air.

You can feel it in your bones. You can smell the snow in the clouds.

And you know it's time to button up, to get ready for the inevitable.

Sunday at our house was the last good day for raking leaves. We'd already disassembled the patio furniture and tucked it away. The firepit, which bears a serious dent from the ice storm of 2005, has been pretty much a birdbath these days. But we leave it out in hopes of having one more fire outside some evening after truly cold weather arrives.

The leaves, of course, are an issue.

Like most good Hoosiers, my Plan A is to let them just blow east into Ohio. But that trick never seems to work, so raking is inevitable.

When I was a kid, raking was one of those chores that could be turned into fun. We used to rake the leaves into long piles, connecting with other piles, until rooms began to make shape. Eventually, the floor plan of a small house would appear on the lawn.

At that point, work was abandoned and play took over. If you have an outline of a house, much like the floor plan of a Clue game, some sort of play just happens.

This time around, there was no play involved.

Fortunately, Sally was home from I.U., so the three of us worked on it together, making a daunting job much more manageable. Our rakes are due for a major upgrade, however.

There's one really good one, which Sally snagged. There's one so beaten up and bent it wouldn't qualify for a decent garage sale, which Connie used. And there's one that's essentially a garden rake, not suitable for raking leaves. That one was mine, of course. (I raked up almost as much thatch from the lawn as actual leaves.)

The destination for the leaves was the street, though these days they're not burned, they're picked up by the city and taken to a site along North Morton Street for composting.

A million years ago, when I was a kid, those leaves would have been burned at the curb, sending up a noxious smoke that irritated everyone with allergies for blocks around. It didn't qualify as an environmentally sound procedure, but it had its charm, and kids always enjoyed it because it provided an opportunity to play with matches.

On Sunday, however, it was simply several trips to the curb, dumping the leaves for others to haul away, an act short on symbolism and the romance of a good leaf fire.

Still, there was a good, solid feeling about buttoning up for winter. The grass was mowed one last time. The garden's last harvest came in long ago. Glass has replaced screens in the storm doors. Thanksgiving is behind us, and the Christmas season is on the horizon.

That's okay. We're ready. Bring it on. Let it snow.[[In-content Ad]]