Have you noticed, as we grow older that our world grows smaller? After retiring, I stay closer to home, travel less, consume fewer goods, move slower, sleep more and use the bathroom more. This smaller universe has layers of fascinating intrigues.

Even though I have planted various trees on several locations in four different states, new tree information has popped up. Did you know that persimmon trees are male & female? Several years ago, I stuck a dozen of them around our slough in the back yard. One tree had six persimmons this fall, which means there are guy persimmon trees near-by. Ironically, I heard our blue spruce conifers saying to the girl persimmon trees, " take it off! Take it all off" as they began defoliating.

We planted a little sycamore tree near our house. Its leaves grow into huge fan-size shade units. However, after this first frost, the leaves shrink to the size of a hand.

Then this: my wife talks through walls. After more than a decade of living with her, I made the discovery. A couple of weeks ago, while in our sitting area, she was far away in the kitchen. She begins talking at me through the kitchen wall, down the hallway, through the great room wall and into the sitting room. It is of vital national interest that she lets me know some crucially important; it is an earth-shaking piece of information. Yet, only her sounds, not sense, with their vibrating tones gets through. I have no concept about her concerned pronouncement on heaven or earth. She can feel better having done her duty in her telling, a sense of real accomplishment.

How did I discover this female telepathic phenomenon? Last month, while sitting on the stool in a bathroom with the door closed, she stood outside talking to me through a closed bathroom door. I merely could hear mumbles of her conclusive mandate getting delivered. After flushing the stool, I opened the door. Smilingly I responded, "Yes, dear". She smiled back displaying grand personal satisfaction for communicating so well.

Oh, about the trees….this fall had an enormous amount of leaves and falling nuts off trees. Oak, black walnut and shagbark hickory trees grew an over abundance of their product. I racked away as many nuts as possible from the lawn. Those well-supplied trees kept dropping nuts, which fell like dive bombs on anything below. Next, I mowed the lawn, mulching and pulverizing huge piles of fallen leaves. Would you believe that winds came, blowing in tons of leaves from neighbor’s yards into our yard? I had to mow a second time crushing their migrating batch.

Had I succeeded? Oh, no…winds sent additional bunches of leaves. This time, the waiting game came into mind. Sure, enough the winds blew the final bunch back into neighbor’s lawns. Again, guys started their lawn mowers to grind away.

I watched the neighbor across the street attack his leaves. The genius used his back-feed mower, where mowed leaves poured out at his feet. He would make a squared pass, once around the out side. The chopped leaves spewed directly on the same space. Each smaller square resulted in the same leaves dropping in the same place in the same lane. He tried reversing mowing over the same pile of leaves with same futile results. He attempted a crisscross pattern, but left the same pile of leaves in their exact spot. Thirty minutes later, he quit. He, too, learned what " the North wind giveth, the North wind taketh away"…. He found that inclusive concept that our world grows smaller.

by Dick Kettle