Wayne Weekly “Leaves”

I generally take our dog Frankie for his morning walk around 6 am. Now that we’re well into the dark mornings, Frankie and I venture through sidewalks lit only by streetlights and an occasional motion detector on a house of garage. The motion detectors sensors set to reach beyond the end of driveways are not my favorite. I always feel like an escaped convict when I walk by those homes.

During our early morning walks this fall, at least on dry days, I enjoy crunching through the fallen leaves and watching them being blown about by a sudden gust of wind. Those moments always remind me of being a kid during the fall season. Funny how things spark your recall mode.

As a kid growing up with two brothers and two sisters, as well as neighbors who were in the same age range as I was, we would often rake up mountains of leaves and, after building up speed in a measured raceway, we would jump into the pile with much vigor. I still hear the crunch and remember the smell of those leaves. After play, we would move the leaves out by the road, and, get this, burn the pile. The village allowed that. House after house would have charred circles along the roadside in front of their homes. The smell of burning leaves was a delight to us. Sometimes we would throw apples into the ignited leaves and then retrieve them after they had “cooked” a while. After brushing off the ashes, we would eat them. I never died from that.

Good childhood memories are precious, and worth repeating. I think today children are missing out on so many outside adventures. The kind of memories that crunch, and smell like burning leaves.

Genesis 1:11-12: Then God said, “Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees on the earth bearing fruit after their kind with seed in them”; and it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed after their kind, and trees bearing fruit with seed in them, after their kind; and God saw that it was good.