Fall is some people’s favorite time of the year for many reasons. The cool weather, the holidays associated with it, or the pretty colors of the leaves on the trees. Well for me, fall is at the bottom of the list. As much as I love football, and let me be the first to tell you I fucking love football, fall just doesn’t do it for me. What season has two names anyway? Where did the Autumn/Fall plug-ins even come from? Not important. I hate pretty much everything about this season and at the top of my list of reasons why is those goddamn leaves. In fact, I always dreaded the idea of fall because of those fucking leaves. As a kid, I had no problem with outdoor jobs like cutting the grass, power washing the sidewalk, watering the flowers, planting shrubs or whatever it may have been but one job I hated more than anything else in the world was raking leaves. I would honestly rather teabag a bear trap than go outside to rake fucking leaves. Its truly hell on earth and if you actually enjoy this outdoor activity then you’re a communist.
The first and worst part of it was getting the mucky leaves out of the downspouts and the curb out front. Muddy, disgusting, ground up leaves that looked like a vegans shit in the street that clogged up drainage whenever it rained. They were cold. They were wet. They were dirty. There’s not enough adjectives on this motherfucking planet that could even describe this shit. The horrible thing about it too was that you always had to bare hand it in there because you never wanted to ruin your gloves. *Now I know how the Royal Family’s gynecologist feels* I still to this day have PTSD from those experiences.
Another element to the leaf raking irritation was getting them out of the bushes. In the front of my house, we used to have these somewhat prickly bushes that covered the foundation wall and my mom always used to say that I needed to get the leaves out from them. It was horrible. Sticking my hand in the cold, dormant, prickly bushes because the leaves would fall and get speared up in there. I never wanted to get yelled at because I had other things I’d get yelled at for so I always bit the bullet and did it. After about 15 minutes of fisting these bushes and bleeding out from my hands, I'd just give up and take the blame. Just imagine sticking your hand in a garbage disposal to feel what this bullshit task was all about.
The last component of the leaf raking experience was bagging them. Back home, the fall was a very windy time. You can put the pieces together here. The bag would stay open about 10% of the goddamn time. You may think that putting the bag in a garbage pail would solve this issue. Well it did not since the wind would blow under the bag lapped over the side of the pail and basically blow it out the top. Because you’ve just absolutely had it at this point, you angrily take a handful and stuff it in there only to have the bag detach from the side of the pail and all the leaves miss the opening. By the time you get the bag situation in order, the pile is strewn all over the lawn again and a 30-minute process according to my mom now is bordering a 4-hour period of wanting to blow my fucking brains out.
Side Note: As you may know, I am a huge golf guy and there are plenty of golf guys out there who love playing in the fall. Pants, quarter-zips, crisp mornings, etc. Well that's all great but foliage is the reason why I will forever despise fall golf. I can't be going out there and having my tee shots run out into the rough and not be able to find my ball because there's a million leaves on the ground. An already $100 dollar round with the men's club now starts tipping the $140 mark because you can go through an entire box of Pro-Vs by the end of the day. That's the kind of shit that really ticks my clock and why I refuse to play come late October.
So that ends my rant about one of the worst things on planet earth. Abrupt ending, I get it, but I have to keep my emotions in check so better to stop here before I get too far out in front of myself. In conclusion, all of you artsy folk who go out and take fancy Instagram pictures in the “pretty” foliage while captioning it “Fall Things” or something tacky like that, just remember that eventually you have to clean that garbage off your front lawn at some point. Hopefully now you have a better perspective on the season at the very bottom of the totem pole.
Take a note
-Doorman
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