TheBanyanTree: Indian Summer

[Margaret R. Kramer]

This has to be it.  It can’t stay this nice for much longer.  We do live in
Minnesota and our winters are nasty, aren’t they?  But in the last few
years, our warm and orange falls have dragged on into November and we’ve
barely had any snow.  Perhaps our climate is changing and Minnesota will
become the new Arizona or Florida and draw restless seniors to our state
like a magnet.

We need rain.  We had a bit of rain more than a week ago, but we need more.
I need to do a rain dance that will move the jet stream over us and drown us
in rain.  The swamps, the ponds, the lakes are drying up in this cool, dry
air.  We need lots of snow this winter to fill them back up or else we’ll be
known as the state with 10,000 holes in the ground instead of lakes.

But for now, we can bathe in these incredibly warm days with a perfect blue
sky accenting the remaining reds and oranges of the maple trees as they
decide to join the autumn party.  The warm weather has encouraged our
neighbors to go all out with their Halloween decorations.  We see pumpkins
clustered on stoops, scary witches flying on broomsticks, and skinny
skeletons hanging from trees on our walks with the dogs.

We’ve opened our windows and those pesky Asian beetles which look like
ladybugs have found their way in.  There are a few of them on the ceiling
that I’ll have to vacuum up later.  My mighty hunter black cat just ignores
them, so I can’t count on him to keep our house vermin free.

A couple of caterpillars have made cocoons right by our front door.  I want
to show them to my grandsons, but I’m worried that curious four year old and
two year old hands will dismantle the cocoons when I’m not looking to see
what’s really happening inside.

Although it’s very warm and the deer must have enough to eat, they still
raid my bird feeders.  The other night, around midnight, Ray heard a
gunshot.  He saw flashlights moving like ghosts across the backyard.  He
went out to see what was going on.  The police had shot a deer that had set
off someone’s security alarm.  The dead deer was partly in our backyard.
The police dragged the deer away to a waiting truck.

The next afternoon, our dog CoCo found the spot where the deer died.  There
were blood spots on the brown leaves and we can see the indentation in the
leaves were the police dragged it out.  CoCo was held there by the scent.
Was the deer’s spirit lingering there?

Our flowers, especially the pansies, impatiens, and salvia are still
blooming.  Well, next weekend, no matter how nice it is, the potted plants
will be rudely un-potted.  The lawn furniture will be gathered up and
stuffed into our overcrowded garage.  I’ll start raking the reluctantly
falling oak leaves in the backyard.  Indian summer has to end sometime,
doesn’t it?  I bought a new winter jacket so we can’t have Indian summer all
winter, can we?  Or can we?

But before we find out if we’re going to have a real macho winter or not, we
’re going to celebrate this wonderful Indian summer with one last barbeque.
We’ll sit on our deck one last time and be surrounded by flickering candles
and enjoy a little bonfire.  We’ll inhale the dry leaf smells, the grilling
smells, and the burning smells of autumn.

Margaret R. Kramer
margaretkramer at earthlink.net

http://www.polarispublications.com
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For myself I am an optimist - it does not seem to be much use being anything
else.

Sir Winston Churchill