Just Yesterday

I thought it was happening back on Wednesday when our ginkgo tree suddenly started dropping its leaves. They make a sound like rain on the ground.But then just as abruptly, it changed its mind and stopped.“They're still green. Maybe that's why,” I thought but no.  At  8a,m yesterday, a strange flickering light fell  across the rug in this upstairs room, making me look out the window. They were coming down for real, still green or not.Ginkgo leaves hold on and hold on, then fall all at once within a matter of hours. Sometime they have turned to gold. Sometimes not.One time, just after we moved in this house, David and I were standing outside with our babies, when a strolling stranger passed our yard and stopped.“You know you have one of the only two ginkgoes in this town,” he said in grave tones.“OK,” we said, knowing little then of the power of trees.“Yes,” he said sternly. “The ginkgo is one of the Nature’s first trees, a real primitive. Look how its leave grows right from its large branches; there are no little branches!”We started noticing then. That was in April and six months late we saw what you will see in this short clip. We heard what you will hear.We're like the ginkgo too in our own way. Say we  live and live. Willard Scott salutes us. Al Roker too. And we get to thinking maybe we WON'T have go after all.But then the call comes and we do go, just as these leaves went, making their lovely carpet on the grass.  What a mystery it all is, even here in our big-shot 21st century.[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVv1vsHXHmQ]