The sound of fall is all around

It's Saturday here at the little house on the lake, and the next two months is always my favorite time here. The boats are quieter, the smell of gasoline fumes fades away and a certain peace descends upon the neighborhood. Well almost.

The sounds of fall are all around now. First there is the sound of chipmunks running around gathering their winter food supply. This of course leads to the sound of Buttons, the hunter dog, chasing them around the property. He has yet to figure out two things. One is he can't climb trees or go underground, and two, when the chipmunk goes either up or down, he won't be coming back the same way, but instead will appear someplace else.

Then there is the sound of the incoming artillery. No, it isn't of the explosive kind, just sounds like it. Throughout the day and night we hear the random bangs of acorns falling from the numerous oak trees around the house. They hit the roof with a loud bang and roll along eventually finding their way to the stoop where each morning as I leave for work in the dark I manage to step and slip on them. Or the other alternative is they hit the car or the truck. Then we either have the metallic bang of acorn against metal, or the quiete but also more destructive sound of them landing on the windshield. I can live with the dings on the hood, but I can't see through the dings in the windshield.

Fall also brings the gentle falling of the leaves from those very same oak trees as well as the maples and birches. With that comes the sound of the neighbors constant raking, blowing and transporting of his leaves via tractor and utility trailer down the road to the neighborhood leaf dump. I am sure he waits outside his house for the leaves to fall so he can use his yard tools. There are some days he gets lazy which results in a phone call from my other neighbor telling me how he used his leaf blower to blow his leaves into my yard. I guess neighbor number two expects me to blow them back, I'm not quite sure. 

I don't usually rake. I found that if I leave the leaves out there long enough, that same west wind I complain about in the winter because of the cold it brings to the house, blows them all to neighbor 3's yard, where, being the conscientious landscaper he is, removes them and puts them in the same neighborhood leaf dump down the road. So all is good here at the little house on the lake.