The Last Friday in November 2011

Oak trees shed their leaves
Scatter them across brown lawns
A chill in the air

When I went outside to pick up my newspaper, I noticed that there were yellow and gold oak leaves scattered across the neighbor’s yard. A few of the leaves were falling, but most of the leaves still clung to the tree. This afternoon the wind increased and more leaves fell from the tree. In a couple of days, someone will begin raking the leaves and putting them in a trash bag for the garbage trucks to hall away.

When I was a child, people racked leaves into piles and burned them. I can remember my grandfather raking the cottonwood and elm leaves that covered his yard. After he racked the leaves into piles, he would burn them. Grandpa always had a water hose close by in case of an emergency. He never burned leaves without having a source of water incase the fire got out of hand.

Today, it is against the law the burn leaves in the city, so the leaves we put into bags or trashcans and let the garbage trucks hall them away. The leave could also be used as mulch, but since neither my neighbor nor myself plant a garden the leaves are put in the trash.