Fall
© By Abraham Lincoln 

When tree leaves begin to change color and fall; it is fall. Fall brings back memories of great tepee-like piles of leaves burning along curbs. When you see pumpkins rotting on vines in weedy fields and choke on smoke from burning leaves; it’s fall. 

Fall is when spent flowers take on a startling change in their appearance. What was a beautiful, purple cone flower, that fed the world of honeybees, bumblebees, butterflies and hummingbirds, is now a wreck of spiked seeds that the goldfinches loves to pluck and eat. 

When the snow flies again this winter, any remaining seeds mean survival of the Purple Coneflower. 

I thought this half-eaten seed head was interesting and worth the space on any flash card — a reminder that a perfect clone of it will return if Mother Nature has her way. There are other signs of next spring if you just look around. 

My rhubarb is storing energy for a new season and the stalks should be larger, juicier; and, the leaves big — umbrellas for garden fairies. 

The grass has been through a do or die situation this summer. Lush in the spring and dead in the summer with one rebirth mid-summer after a torrential one-half inch of rain, that didn’t fall on Indiana, landed here. 

The rain that fell, much to the surprise of black crickets, hiding in giant cracks in the ground; had to crawl out or drown. 

I felt sorry for does giving birth on both sides of Interstate 70. No place to lay in the shade and no place to find a local supply of water; many died trying to quench their thirst on the other side of the road. 

Have you noticed the number of spiders, of all shapes and sizes crawling in the house this summer? Big spiders squirt when stepped on and small ones disappear. Squirters give me the creeps and bad dreams. 

With heat in degrees of one hundred plus and curled up leaves dying for a drink, was this summer an introduction to Global Warming? 

I think it was, but in spite of what I think: We should pee twice and flush once to save half of all fresh water used in our toilets; the US Government is silent on water conservation. 

I have not seen a television commercial telling us the Great Lakes is our last hope for a drink of fresh water; probably because we don’t own them. 

Perhaps our politicians already sold the water in them to some foreign nation: China, Japan, Korea, and Arabia comes to mind. 

Imagine, if your mind is still working, that you are dying of thirst and the puddles have dried up and the streams are littered with smelly fresh water clamshells, and you can’t get a drink. Would you like to find a bowl of fresh water setting beside a door? 

Many years ago, out front, where passing cats, dogs and occasional coyote wander at will; I put a small cement bowl under the water faucet. Each day I turn the spigot on and refill the bowl with fresh water. Birds know it is there and drink from it all day long. A large, white, skunk drank from it last week.