Autumn in Chicago

 

Cars covered in fall leaves (Look closely. they're honey locust leaves)

The honey locust trees are the last to get their leaves in the spring, and the first to drop them in autumn. Tiny little yellow leaves everywhere. Open the door to your car and you'll find them stuck in every crevice and on the floor. Yes, it is the season they call 'fall' because that's what happens. Leaves fall, temperatures fall, and old people start looking forward to falling in a couple of months. Winter ice is brutal. Autumn is the season when I remember that I don't live in Florida anymore. Not that I dread winter, it's just that fifty degrees in September is so much colder than fifty degrees in February. If we get a warm spell in January or February and the temperature jumps up near fifty degrees, you'll see Chicagoans running around in tee shirts and shorts. Sometimes they'll even break out the flip flops. Not me. Unless it's over sixty degrees I stick to the long pants and layers of shirts and sweaters.

In the fall of the first year we moved back to Chicago from Florida, on the first day the weather turned nasty and dropped to under fifty degrees, I got ready to walk the dogs. I put on a sweat shirt, the big fluffy coat Mark had bought me, a hat and gloves, and braved the cold along with Chandler. He also didn't like being cold. He was a Florida dog all the way. We hurried down the street to the corner where a family of Chicago firemen lived. As we turned up Thorndale the firemen were all out there, drinking beers in tee shirts and shorts. I'll never forget the distain in the voice from one of the older guys in the group. "Geez, look at this guy. He's all bundled up already. Damn, it's only October fer krissakes."

The firemen don't live in that house anymore. A family from Vietnam bought it. You know, Vietnam. Where it's hotter than hell most of the year. I've seen them outside in the middle of winter, also in tee shirts.