Autumn Leaves

The year before last, i, being a passive observer, started noticing when exactly in the fall, that leaves are entirely gone from tree branches, and also from my mental images of a northern hemisphere summer.

i am terrible with observation, not to mention things that are minute...well, i know leaves falling is surely not something minute! Yet...back when Sam and i were still a part of Ypsi, i hadn't paid any attention until the year before we moved. i drove to school and work, and hardly looked away from the road ahead. When friends told me about things they saw on their way somewhere - a deer, a grand house, a flock of wild birds flying by - i listened with awe.

i think i am exactly like the type of person described in a popular Japanese comic series, Touch, created by Adachi. When there is a goal, i don't stray, i don't stop much to look aside, and i tend to ignore what happens outside my life scope. Just the other day, i thought of this i, and realized that i was probably born with a gift of focusing: i focus on one thing at a time, and i focus very well.

It was something that came in the path of what i focused on that eventually brought me to the discovery of leaves falling: sunlight. One autumn afternoon, Sam and i were going out for some grocery shopping. i noticed the car was no longer in the shade of a particular tree like it used to be. It was under the sun. And then i looked up and saw that the tree was leave-less! It dawned on me it was already the time of a year for us to slow and cool down.

Last October, i was prepared to welcome bare branches here and there. During that week, when i walked back to the apartment from school, there were occasionally strong gusts of wind. Each time they swiped by my street, some leaves fell from the trees hopping, twiddling, hurdling, and dancing. i had enormous delight in that show. On the 18th, all the leaves retreated from my street, tacitly announcing the approach of yet another winter.

Through last weekend, there were a few days when it was gusty and downpoury. Very stormy. The winds actually howled even in broad daylight. But now, outside the windows, there are still quite a lot greenish leaves hanging on the upper branches. Just to have it down on my record: it's the 17th today :-)