Leaves

I like autumn leaves when they're colorful on the trees.  I don't like them when they're all brown, shriveled, and piled up on my lawn.  It wasn't so windy today so I went out with the leaf blower and blew leaves until both batteries were kaput.  Then I piled the leaves on a tarp and hauled them to the curb.  Now I've got the batteries charging and will go out and do more tomorrow.  It's supposed to be windy on Monday so I want to get more of them moved before then.

The only birds that showed up today were Juncos and this one decided to sample the delights of the platform feeder.  This is the first time I've ever seen one feeding anywhere but the ground.  It must be a daredevil teenager of a bird or a rebel.  All the others were clustered on the grass but this one was high above having the pick of the seeds.

I stopped down at Zambaldi this afternoon to drop of DIL1's hemmed pants and some suckers and Halloween pencils for LC and OJ and found DS standing on a picnic table fixing the reflector on a patio heater.  He said they get blown over and the thin metal of the top gets bent so he takes them apart, pressed out the dents, and puts them back together.

At Friday Night Knitting I got to the crown decreases of October Preemie Hat #4.  I'll finish it tomorrow so it'll be done before November blows in.

 

 

 

 

30 October--Barbara Malcolm, The Seaview. 

Chapter 6

I awoke the next morning to the sound of roaring wind and driving rain.  Even the courtyard rooster that I had dubbed Errol Flynn for his varied harem and loud crowing boasts was silent in the face of the storm.  I plugged in the coffee and opened the sliding door to the outdoors.  The rain spattering on the tiles sounded like a fire hose.  I had a feeling that no work would happen that day but I showered and dressed anyway while the coffee perked.  It had been a long time since I had used a percolator and I was enjoying the homey sound it made.  It took long enough so that I had plenty of time to get myself ready in the morning, coming out of the bathroom as the last flurry of perks filled the studio.  I had learned to let the coffee settle while I dressed after pouring myself a cup too soon the first morning and getting a least a half-inch of sludge with it.

When I opened my email while the coffee perked there was one from my son, Will.  I didn’t know where he found them; he had to subscribe to a service that culls bad luck stories, especially ones about widows in the Caribbean so he could keep up the gloom and doom.

“Mother, I read in the Miami Herald online that Americans are getting victimized in droves in the Caribbean.  One in three have been conned and bankrupted by unscrupulous people that offer them properties, take all their money, and never deliver.”

Oh, Will, I thought, can’t you let me have pleasure in my adventure?  I didn’t remember him being quite so pessimistic.

“Will," I wrote to him, "I’m fine.  No one has taken my money and run off since I’m standing in the middle of the results of my Caribbean land deal.  I appreciate your continued concern but I’m fine, really, I’m fine and so is my hotel.”

As I looked out the patio door at the rain it began to slacken, and by the time I had downed a bowl of Cheerios with skim milk and a banana, it had stopped.  I pulled on my work tennis shoes, picked up the hammer which felt like it was growing into my hand, and left for the short stroll down the road to my hotel.

 My hotel, just the sound of those two words filled me with excitement and pride.  When I got there the back door from the garden into the kitchen was standing open.  I looked around for Silas’ dusty black pickup and didn’t see it, but I thought maybe he had stayed with Johnno and not gone home last night.

“Hello?” I said as I went inside.  It smelled funny in there but I attributed it to the fact that the walls had been pulled down and old dust stirred up.  “Silas?”  I walked through the short hall to the sitting room, expecting at any moment to hear his answering shout.  The front door on the sea side was open too, the newly planed door swinging in the fresh breeze coming from the ocean.  I froze as I crossed the threshold to see an old tin tub in which someone had made a fire sunk in the middle of the floor, beer bottles flung everywhere and a corresponding circle of badly charred wood on the ceiling above.  Obviously someone had lit a fire.  That’s what I had smelled.

The footsteps behind me didn’t catch my attention until a voice said, “Oh my God.”  I turned around to see Silas staring slack-jawed at the mess.  “What happened here?” he said.

“I have no idea,” I said.  “I had supper in my room and went to sleep after reading a while.  I was tired, all that nail pulling, you know.”

Silas looked at me strangely, not familiar with my tendency to make jokes when I really wanted to scream or cry, but he shrugged and went on.  “We need to get the police here and make a report.  I am surprised that no one noticed.  Usually they pay good attention to the places in Sandy Ground and the station is just down the road.”  He kicked one of the beer bottles and it rolled noisily around in a circle.  “The party must have been pretty quiet.”

I stood there with tears in my eyes, feeling like someone had spit on me.  I folded my arms across my chest, unable to believe that some of the nice people I had met in the last couple of weeks could have done this.

Evidently waiting for me to act, Silas stood next to me, shifting from one foot to the other.  Finally he said, “How about I walk down and get us a policeman?”

“That’ll be good,” I said.  I heard the unshed tears in my voice and he must have too because he just nodded, propped his beloved crowbar in a corner and left me there to survey the mess.

Today's toss was a food service box of heavy duty foil.  I have one in the cupboard and a 3-pack of Reynolds Wrap in reserve so I won't need this big roll of the stuff.

Don't forget to change your clocks back an hour on Saturday night when Daylight Savings Time ends.  I read in the paper that 30 states are considering staying on DST all the time.  I'd like us to stay on Standard Time all the time.  It makes no sense to me to take an hour of daylight from one end of the day and shove it over to the other end of the day.  Just leave the danged clocks alone.  Sorry, it makes me crabby.

--Barbara