Entropy, Flux, Contigency, v1

Finally had a good leaf pile day Sunday. One in the front yard, one in the back. Everybody piled inside getting covered with leafy brown goodness. Natalie dumping stuff on Graham's head.

Later, though, I had to get the front yard one up so it wouldn't "suffocate the grass". These Mexican guys from the soon-to-be shutdown flophouse across the street were looking at me like I was crazy, out there with my rake and my tarp, leaving all kinds of brown interspersed with the green. I know what they were thinking: "Why is that gringo over there working so hard with that rake, when he could pay us $8 an hour for us to blow it away with many decibels."

The thing is (and you knew there had to be a thing), aside from giving you a little workout, using the rake is good because it keeps you in touch with the yard, and with the cyclical and paradoxical nature of all kinds of stuff. Leaves fall. Clean them up. All green. Great. Save for the fact that you're pulling out matter which could biodegrade and enrich the soil right there. Do you fertilize later? But hell, it's the Garden state, ever in need of care.

Nothing is so striking in New Jersey as the piles of plant matter hauled to the curb for pick-up. Everybody's got a little (p)lot, all with plants. We'll be damned if chaos will take over, in the form of plants growing the wrong way. So order is continually inscribing itself on the landscape, spitting disorder out in the form of branches, leaves, and other vegetal detritus, pushed to the curb... (only just starting to get deep)