Autumn in the NorthEastern US

When I lived away from the northeast and didn't have autumn leaves to ponder, I often felt a sense of loss. It was autumn's sweet melancholy that I was missing. The notion implied is that people from the northeast can physically leave their surroundings but will always wonder, no matter where they live, how the leaves are looking back home.

This week on my block in Forest Hills the autumn color fest, which brings countless people here to gawk, is approaching its peak. The turning of the leaves is something that binds us to simpler times when we pressed the leaves in books and brought them to school, or when we used to pile the leaves on our lawns and then jump into the center. No thought was given for broken bones as our young bodies protected us and in our innocence we always seemed to find the soft center of the pile.

Hope you get a chance to see the leaves, and/or at least consider their everlasting effect on our lives.
Here is a photo taken today by our classmate Carol Nelson: