11/3/10 Crunch, Swish

It has been dry for more than 24 hours so the leaves have dried out on the walkways and parking lots. I love to hear them crunch as swish as I walk through them.

Growing up on Education Hill meant that the high school was 5 blocks away. The elementary school was just a few more. The junior high school just beyond that. Another elementary school down to the right. A pre-school down to the left. A private elementary school across the street from that. And another elementary school at the bottom of the hill.

One fall day when I was in junior high, my mother announced to us girls that we were going to go to Hartman Park and play in the leaves. We were mortified. Erika was in elementary school and Barb was in high school. The leaves that fell from the trees at Hartman Park that we drove past everyday were on the main drag directly across from the high school. How embarrassing! We were forced to put on our outdoor play clothes and boots, and walk to the park, and carry rakes to rake them with. We made it there and raked them into piles like we had to and then ran and jumped in them. I don't know how long we were there. Hours. We had so much fun. It started out as this horrible idea that my mother had to force us to have fun and enjoy ourselves. Lo and behold was she ever right. Amazing how moms do these kinds of things. So we quickly forgot about any kind of street traffic and played in the leaves.

We didn't have a lot of money and so I think my mom did what she could to provide us with entertainment and fun as well as creating family bonding time without it being dependent on 'stuff'. I did get 'things' I wanted but I can say that most of the enjoyment I remember about my childhood was the activities that we did and time we shared and how much fun we could have doing free things. We played in the leaves. We had water fights with hoses, guns, and balloons. We played tennis against our garage doors. We played baseball in the front yard. We played hand ball in our hallway. We had family game night where we played board and card games for hours.

My mom taught me that we can be grown-ups and be mature and responsible, but we can also do things that some people label as "kid-play" like play in the leaves and get over ourselves and have fun. I still like to swish and run through the leaves kicking them up as I go along.

I am thankful for the dry leaves that are swirling about this time of year and today particularly.

kk