Raking the Leaves
There was something nostalgic, even romantic, about raking the leaves. Maybe it was the fact that I hadn’t done it in years. It being raking leaves.
This was not a romance story. It was an everyday chore prescribed to me by my mother to be completed after she returned from shopping.
Leaves of this size and structure were easy to rake. I can remember raking so much and gathering so little. That was when I was much younger; a time before college.
As I began to pick up the piles, I wondered about Bethany’s compost heap and if these would benefit it. Even if they did, it would be a challenge to get them to Phoenix anyway. Maybe I could send one or two leaves in an envelope. It wouldn’t help much, but I could brand it as a sort of “magic leaf” that will decompose faster than any other.
“Jack and the Beanstalk” has got to be a story about drugs, I thought. Jack trades the livelihood of his family for “magic beans?” That has drug deal written all over it. Not to mention the rest of the story, involving giants in the sky and geese that laid golden eggs.
That neighbor’s dog was barking too much. It was the only ruiner of my slight nostalgia. Sometimes I think that mocking dogs gets them to shut up.
Bark, bark, bark!, the dog said.
Roof, roof, roof!, I replied.
Bark, bark, bark, bark, baaaark!
Roof, roof, roof, roof, roooooof!
This went on for three minutes before I gave up. I picked up the last of the leaves, wished the dog to hell, and went inside.
Filed under College Years