Thursday, November 1, 2007

Opposition


the orange tree
Originally uploaded by Kerstin Martin
Fall in New England is truly gorgeous. People come from all over the country to see the colors and enjoy the sites.

And then the nice people go home.

And then the leaves fall on the ground.

And those of us that live here have to clean them up.

In Utah, raking leaves was a fun job. You make a pile, you jump in it. I don't even know what happens to the leaves. Do people bag them? Just put them in the trash can?

In New England, raking leaves takes HOURS. And you don't have to rake just once. You have to rake A LOT of times. As I was blowing and then raking leaves today, I found myself shooting evil glances at our neighbor as I coveted his lawnmower/leaf vacuum combo machine. He was just walking around his yard like nothing big was going on and in 30 minutes, his lawn was leaf free.

After repenting of my envy, I had a better time working on the lawn. Working outside really makes me think about the things that I've learned in my life. It was interesting as I looked at the leaves spread all over the lawn. It didn't look like I had that much work to do. But as I started to work, the pile grew bigger and bigger and bigger. Isn't that the way with things? And I was thinking a lot today about how there is opposition in all things. Pretty leaves on trees....lots of work when they fall.

5 comments:

Katy said...

Yup - you take the good your take the bad you take em both and there you have ...

You blog reminded me of Blair, Jo, Natalie and Tootie.

Ace said...

I'm afraid I may one day be one of the "nice people" who come to enjoy the leaves and then promptly leaves for someone else to rake them. (That was kind of a crazy sentence.)

Sarah Jane said...

THis is how my parents taught us to work as kids. I clearly remember those saturadays wellesley raking the leaves with my dad while more leaves kept falling to the ground. it is like shoveling snow while it is still snowing!! But oh...I miss it. Any vacancies in your cul-de-sac??

Macy said...

ktb - Thanks. Song stuck in my head.

Ace - I would love for you to come enjoy the leaves. I will rake after you.

Sarah - I'll make a vacancy if you need a vacancy. Ditch your pretty new condo by the copper mine and move to Massachusetts!! :)

Michal said...

think of all the exercise you got and calories you burned by raking those leaves by hand. your poor neighbor probably had to go to the gym later to make up for his power tools!

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