Thursday, April 10, 2008 7:37 PM CDT
COLUMN: We'll lean on rakes and wonder what the 'h---' to do with our leaves
By HARRY REYNOLDS, Editorial page editor
hreynolds@jg-tc.com
I’ve don’t favor leaves falling off trees. It seems like a waste of time and energy on the part of our woody friends.
In the fall, trees tease us with colorful foliage. In a few short weeks, most of the leaves are gone. Trees stand stark naked. Dark skeletons with branches and limbs, they speak of winter, bringing with it blankets of snow, ice-covered sidewalks and roads.
At the age of 65, winter doesn’t appeal to me. It did when I was a child and looked forward to winter storms. If they were bad enough, schools closed.
In the 1950s, announcements of schools closing came through the medium of radio. Radios lived on static, giving announcers an air of mystery. As if they were in some far-off land covering war.
Most radios in the early 1950s were still boxy affairs, but the boxes were getting smaller, some fitting on tables. Soon, radios would be miniaturized, packed with batteries and portable.
The decline of the big creatures, fine polished wood affairs with big dials and backlit channel markers came rather quickly, replaced by round-screen televisions. Heavy, ponderous things, television sets.
When we finally got a black-and-white television — in 1954 — the family gathered around, quite in awe, and watched a concert. Not like today, when country, rock, rap and mutant variations, rip at eardrums and drive neighbors to bug police to do something they could easily do themselves.
“Would you please turn it down?” might have a slight impact on our taxes and allow police to spend more time doing their jobs.
Which brings to mind a call the police got from a woman in an apartment building. She was upset because a tenant in the apartment below was grilling steaks on his balcony.
This seems like a trite complaint, hardly worthy of beckoning police. Of course, I won’t admit to listening to police calls. People are not supposed to do that.
We pretend not to, but the fact is a police officer is under constant public surveillance.
Any community worth its salt is attuned to what’s going on in the police department. It’s no secret when crimes like the grilling-steak-on-an-apartment-balcony occur.
The best thing about the Mattoon police calls is the barking dog. It’s the same dog, barking, no matter where police go.
I don’t know whether this particular canine has an uncanny knack for interrupting communications between officers and dispatcher, or whether it’s a police dog cruising in a squad car.
The 1950s, given the absence of scanners, the activities of the police department were traced by moms with phones with a network of other moms. The network mainly served the purpose of keeping kids like me from sneaking a smoke, or tracking down boys who practiced the language of their fathers.
Using such language usually resulted in a close acquaintance with a bar of soap, a spanking or grounding. Today, I’m free to use such language, but rarely do. Like most things forbidden in youth, it’s lost its appeal.
I admit to enjoying hearing kids cuss like sailors. It would be even better if their moms used the soap or the strap, but cussing has become an acceptable way to communicate.
Profanity proliferates. It doesn’t come close to sex though. TV steams with the sultry stuff. I admit to enjoying beautiful women bouncing around, but the love scenes set to music, with roaming hands, all sorts of noises, put me to sleep.
Most men do that, I suspect. The trouble with love scenes is they last too long. Ten seconds is enough, about nine too long.
We’ve come a long way from the time when big, polished-wood radios held sway. When families gather round to hear their favorite shows. Days when children erupted in cheers when news of school-stopping storms came riding on the deep-throated voice of the radio.
Today a storm comes rushing through, we call the school and get a recorded announcement on whether school will be open.
We also can get the news off the newspaper’s Web page. It is the way of the world to steal anticipation.
Only a few years ago, many bereft of breathing problems looked forward to raking and burning leaves. Children liked to leap into the piles before they were set to flame.
Leaning on rakes, with crisp air framing whispering smoke, tired organizers of nature’s leavings mused.
Winter would be riding earth’s spinning train. Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, dreary January and February. Ushered in by an exercise pioneers would judge foolish.
Charleston still allows people to burn leaves, as long as neighbors don’t complain. Mattoon outlawed the whole practice several years ago. The council had its reasons — all good.
Now the city declares in addition to not allowing burning, it won’t collect leaves. Too expensive.
We’ll lean on our rakes this fall and wonder what the “h—-” we’re going to do with them.
The only solution is for trees to stop wasting their time and energy...shedding leaves.
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Early Bird wrote on Apr 11, 2008 5:23 AM: