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October 12, 1995
Today is one of those warm fall days where you cannot help
but smile at everyone around you as you walk down the street. There's
a breeze in the air without a hint of chill and everywhere you look leaves
are flying around. It's as if the trees all huddled when it got cold for
the first time, held their breath, and turned bright red from the exertion.
Then, one at a time, they just signed and relaxed and all their leaves
began to fall. 
Of course, it didn't happen
all at once. I found two trees today reaching out towards each other.
Lovers trying to reach one another? Perhaps nature's own rendition or
Michaelangelo's "Creation of Man" from the Sistine Chapel?
The carpets of leaves around campus is a welcome change from the usual summer mixture of Well Manicured Lawns, patches of newly repaired ground with the special turquoise "Spray On Grass" fertilizer, and the endless parade of construction trucks we have seen as the entire campus renovates itself. Suddenly the greens and turquoises and browns have given way to vibrant patches of red, yellow, orange, and the in-between hues named only in Crayola Crayon boxes.
That is, of course, until the Foliage Fascists come out. And today they are out. Teams of men with large trucks which suck up all the leaves and other implements which are turning Dartmouth back into the green and neat campus that it normally is.
Nature had just a few days to turn this campus into a wild frenzy of life and color. And now the grounds are returning to quiet, domestic neatness.
I kept a handful of leaves to myself to remind myself that there is still magic in the world. Shh. Don't tell anyone. They might come clean them up if they knew...