Sunday, November 18, 2007
Autumn breeze, soft and sweet,
Tossing leaves so they tumble at my feet…
The words of the not-yet-popular song by (guess who?) rang in my ears as I hurriedly raked leaves last Thursday afternoon. The city would be collecting the leaves on Friday, and we were instructed to have them at the curb before 7 a.m.
Only an hour remained before dinner, and I had to go to work that night. I cleared most of the leaves from the front yard, and by the side of the house, in 37 minutes. That’s it, I thought. I’ll have to let the rest go.
Friday morning came, and Wendi had a doctor appointment at 9 a.m. Upon returning from the appointment, I noticed that my leaf piles were still at the curb, so I decided to take my chances and begin raking the back yard, which didn’t look as bad as the front yard did before raking it the day before.
Boy, was I wrong! The long grass had hidden most of the leaves, which were quite plentiful in the back yard. Using a 30-gallon trash bag, I gathered 12 bags of leaves and hauled them to the curb. After finishing the back yard, I redid the side and front yards, gathering another two bags. Finally finished, I checked the time. It was 2:14 p.m. and still there was no sign of anyone picking up the leaf piles.
I proceeded to take this picture on the digital camera at 2:18 p.m. As I was showing Wendi the picture, two trucks pulled up to collect the leaves. It was now 2:22 p.m. Only a couple of minutes passed before they scooped up the leaf piles and were gone. The leaves had been collected no more than 10 minutes after I finished raking! Not often do things work out this well. I considered myself blessed.
