Making the Most of Every Day

I spent most of the morning attending to my physical needs; blood drawn at the local hospital, eyes examined at my ophthalmologist.  The drive home was far from leisurely for my dilated pupils rebelled at the bright sunlight glistening off of buildings and pavement. Fortunately, there was little traffic and the stoplight gods were looking favorably upon me.

It is hard to believe that it is late October. Except for the heavy layer of leaves on the ground, everything about the day cries summer. It isn’t even noon and the temperature is already in the seventies and the stiff wind blows warm. There was no way I could stay indoors to write. Using a plastic lawn chair as my computer table, I sit on the back stoop, typing on my laptop.

I had raked last night clearing away the maple and birch leaves that had littered my small lawn around the house. Not unexpectedly, I awoke to find that my raking effort had been futile. The red oaks, resistant to the wind and rain of the past two weeks, have finally succumbed and dropped their burnt sienna leaves in rebellious fury.  The raked lawn is filled once again.

A solitary crow swoops back and forth across the yard, cawing out with no response from her companions. Long past the morning breakfast hour, the yard is empty of wildlife except for that crow and a handful of small birds chirping up in the tall pines. I wish I could say the day was perfect, but cannot. My neighbor, addicted to any yard tool with a motor, blows her leaves into a pile to be chewed up with a branch chipper. Why she does this makes little sense to me. She wears ear plugs, worried about her hearing yet have little concern for the impact those obnoxious tools have on her human and nonhuman neighbors.   I sit here indigent and self righteous, but know that I too am guilty of being an annoying neighbor and keep my opinions to myself.

The wind continues to knock down leaves and I’m constantly brushing them off of my keyboard. It is a small price to pay for such a beautiful work environment. Gracie has jumped off my lap and has wrapped herself in a bed of leaves. Her contented face tells me that I am not the only one who appreciates a day like today.

In less than seven hours, this special day will end replaced by an incoming front of rain and snow showers coupled with drastically colder temperatures. I tell myself that there will be more days like today, a lame attempt to ease into that truth called winter. A friend of mine recently wrote to say that a beloved teacher in her community died of an aneurysm at the young age of 59. She reminded me that we need to make the most of every day. Okay, so my neighbor uses irksome leaf blowers and my dilated pupils make it hard to see in the sunshine. But I am alive, healthy and the day is beautiful. What is there to complain about?