ENJOYING THE WEATHER

Finally the weather has changed. It is cooler; the bugs are gone; the skies are clear;

and the crops are in.

It's fall. The chickens
roam fartherafield on
days like this because

the grass is filled with

grasshoppers, a
delicate treat

for chickens.

Turnips are starting to get larger and should be ready to eat in just a couple of weeks. Certainly ready in time for Thanksgiving. The collards will be ready then, too.

I love the fall.

It's the time here in the country for our Heritage Festival. Some communities call it Founders' Day. We call it the Heritage Festival.

Local churches have Homecoming. So does the high school. There are parades with floats and beautiful young women riding in open convertibles waving at eager young viewers who line the small-town streets hoping one day that they, too, will sit on the back of a convertible in an evening gown and wave the royal wave.

The band plays what might or might not be a Sousa march as their shoes make shuffling sounds on the blacktop of small-town Main Street. And an embarrassed trumpeter just misses hitting the right note. But no one notices because they are watching the majorettes who, like our own grandmothers did, toss their batons high into the air and easily catch it when it falls back to earth.

The parade with its one band and five floats, not counting the Boy Scout troop, the Cub Scout troop, and the Ruritan officers, travels from the pharmacy to the parking lot by what used to be a car dealership. About 3 blocks.

Here in rural America, there are a lot of empty buildings that used to be something but now sit vacant. But we still turn out for our Homecoming parade. And people do come home.

Aunts and uncles, cousins and siblings, in-laws and outlaws, and even exes who owe more back child support than they can ever pay come home to watch their "kin" in the homecoming parade. Traffic is backed up for at least a whole block.

The smell of burning leaves lingers in the air after sunset. Families here still sit down to dinner at the table even if dinner is pizza from the local gas station, our only place to get pizza.

This is fall in small-town USA. I love it.

More later....

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