Time was, and a very long time ago it was, I used to walk the mile and a quarter to school in the morning and home at night. Most of that walk was along one street and broad, newly upgraded street with nice even pavement, to patches of wonky old bricks or slick as ice flagstone, cracked cement, or worse yet no cement at all which turned into slick mud after each rain or in the spring thaw. The sidewalk was and still is fifty years on flat and smooth. In those days it was lined with trees, mostly maple and each year the put on a dazzling display of yellow, oranges. and reds. one tree in particular was almost white.
Walking home carrying our math and spelling books, which most times I especially never even opened, we would plot ways to get into one fenced yard and grab handfuls of horse chestnuts before the owner of the tree came rushing out of the house and threatened to call our parents,which he never did, and or cut down the tree, which he did do.
Soon every morning was frosty, we pretended to be smoking, just puffing out steamy breath, as we huddled in out scarfs and warm jackets. Those same warm jackets we tied around our waists when we walked home, as the colored leaves rained down on us. It was enough to bring out the ballerina in even the toughest boy. Twirling in the breeze imitating the leaves, seeing who could make the most noise as they shuffled along. and who could kick through them making the fallen leaves scatter.
Although I must admit, I still enjoy, standing in a rainfall of colored leaves, or dancing, singing spading, even just standing. It is still fun to shuffle through the leaves, seeing how far I can scatter them.
