Sleeper Cells and Peer Pressure

Two weeks ago, my neighbors were out in full force, virtuously raking leaves and tidying their yards. I didn't exactly lay about eating bon bons, but there wasn't a lot of leaf raking at Sassafras House, largely because my big backyard tree was still holding on to its leaves and I decided there was no point starting the raking with so many more leaves yet to fall.

Over the course of the following week, the leaves came down. We were suddenly awash in fall detritus. No worry, I told myself. I'd rake on Saturday.

On Saturday it rained.

So it was that my leaves were now abundant and wet. Because that makes the chore a lot more fun. I deferred on Sunday and got to work on Monday after school.

The backyard leaves will mostly be raked into my garden patch and left to rot over the winter. By spring, they will be a lovely organic mulch for my spring planting.

But that leaves (pun intended) a lot of work yet to be done. The driveway was particularly awash in leaves and it's gotten difficult to play basketball, so I raked together piles to be moved into bags and hauled to the curb. In an hour, I filled two bags on Monday afternoon and, as you can see, there are plenty more to go. I think of these piles as sleeper cells, just waiting for a breeze to re-arrange them.
I've got a few leaf bags at the curb now, not exactly measuring up to the neighborhood standard, but probably enough to keep the neighbors from turning on me and burying me under the leaves that remain in my backyard.