Yahweh's Jest

I have previously described the view from my second-floor home office, particularly regarding the activities of the Landscaping Crew - miscreants with machinery for stealing the Autumn leaves from my yard.

With their loud blowers, they coax the leaves from the sides and back of my property, along with the leaves of my neighbors, and wrangle them together in a big pile on the sidewalk in front of my house. Then they move a few doors down the street and make big leaf-piles in front of other people's houses. They repeat this process until they are done. Later in the day, a big leaf truck comes slowly down the street with men following along side, scooping up the big piles to be hauled off, presumably to be counted, bagged and sold to leaf fanciers everywhere.

I notice, however, that, before the truck comes around, the prevailing breezes kick up and begin blowing the piled-up leaves around. And, just like the sub-tropical winds in "The Treasure of Sierra Madre" which blow the piles of hard-collected gold dust from their broken bolsas back to the mountains, whence they came, the neighborhood winds slowly blow the golden leaves from their careful piles back to their rightful places in all our yards.

And the blowers and collectors, themselves, have to laugh at the absurdity of their labors in the face of Yahweh's little jest.