October 25: Squashes and Pumpkins, Carving, Robert Frost, "Gathering Leaves," New Cartoon

The autumn days grew shorter, Lurvy brought the squashes and pumpkins in from the garden and piled them on the barn floor, where they wouldn't get nipped on frosty nights...

Autumn days.  Frosty nights.  Squashes and pumpkins.  E. B. White moves easily from the dog days of summer to the golden afternoons of fall to the frozen nights of winter.  Of course, by the end of the book, Wilbur's life is secure, and he can experience the changing seasons without any fear of a visit to the smokehouse.  Wilbur's future is full of jack-o-lanterns and cornstalks, wreaths and holly.

Today was one of those squash and pumpkin October days.  Warm and windy.  The trees were thrashing, and the leaves were flying.  I've never really raked the leaves at my house.  They sit on my lawn until the snow comes, and then they spend the winter composting.  In the spring, the grass comes up, green and rich.  I've seen my neighbors bagging their leaves, scooping them into the back of pickup trucks.  Of course, their lawns look fantastic when they're done, but, in a few weeks, snow will be the great equalizer.  Their lawns and my lawn--everything--will be white.

My daughter and I went to a local pumpkin patch to do some shopping.  She picked out two, huge specimens, and I spent a good portion of the afternoon scooping pumpkin innards and carving faces.  My son chose a one-eyed monster for his jack-o-lantern.  My daughter, a skeletal design.  I managed to sculpt both pumpkins without injuring myself.  That's quite an accomplishment for a person who once ended up in the ER on Christmas day for stabbing himself in the wrist attempting to open a toy for his daughter.

Robert Frost has a great little poem about October days like this.  I have a feeling he would have been one of those neighbors who raked and bagged this time of year.  He probably would have grown pumpkins in his backyard, too.  Large and orange.  Enough to supply the whole street with jack-o-lanterns.

Saint Marty prefers to get his pumpkins the old-fashioned way:  from Walmart.

Gathering Leaves

by:  Robert Frost

Spades take up leaves
No better than spoons,
And bags full of leaves
Are light as balloons.

I make a great noise
Of rustling all day
Like rabbit and deer
Running away.

But the mountains I raise
Elude my embrace,
Flowing over my arms
And into my face.

I may load and unload
Again and again
Till I fill the whole shed,
And what have I then?

Next to nothing for weight,
And since they grew duller
From contact with earth,
Next to nothing for color.

Next to nothing for use.
But a crop is a crop,
And who's to say where
The harvest shall stop? 

 Confessions of Saint Marty