Indian Summer on Honey Hill — One More Leaf, Charlie

Cinnamon Charlie came around the corner of Little Red Bear’s cabin carrying an apple and no particular plans.

Red was standing beside the porch with two leaf rakes.

Charlie stopped chewing.

“I thought we were going to enjoy the afternoon.”

“We are,” Red said, holding out a rake.

Cinnamon Charlie looked at it.

There were several ways he had imagined enjoying the afternoon. None had involved a handle with a leaf rake attached at the end of it.

Above Honey Hill, the November sky was clear and blue. Sunlight warmed the cabin steps, and the breeze was scarcely strong enough to stir the last leaves on the branches. A few mornings earlier, frost had silvered the grass beside the woodpile. Today, Little Red Bear had left his jacket hanging inside.

Cinnamon Charlie took another bite of apple.

“It feels like Summer came back.”

“A little Indian Summer,” Red said.

“That sounds better than raking.”

“It goes very nicely with raking. We can get the path cleared without having cold paws,” Little Red Bear encouraged.

Cinnamon Charlie accepted the rake, although he continued holding his apple in a way that suggested both activities might be difficult to manage at once.

Then something rustled beside the bottom step.

Chewy the Grasshopper had arrived.

He carried a tiny wooden rake and was approaching a pale yellow-green Catalpa leaf lying beside the path.

The leaf was broad, heart-shaped, and at least a foot long. It had a long stem and enough room beneath it to shelter both Chewy and several things he might wish to bring along.

Charlie lowered his apple.

“Oh, this I have to see,” he said.

Chewy the Grasshopper planted his feet, hooked his rake at the edge of the leaf, and pulled.

The leaf moved a little.

He adjusted his grip and pulled again.

This time, the broad edge folded back and over him.

For a moment, there was only a Catalpa leaf with a tiny rake handle sticking out from underneath one side.

Charlie leaned forward.

“Would you like some help?” he inquired.

The rake moved a little.

“He is still working,” Red said. “Give him a minute.”

Chewy emerged beside the stem, brushed himself off, and walked around to inspect the other side of the huge Catalpa leaf.

Charlie continued watching with interest.

“He came prepared,” he pointed out.

“Yes,” Red said. “You have a rake, too.”

Charlie glanced down.

“So I do,” he noted.

Little Red Bear and Cinnamon Charlie began beside the steps, drawing the leaves off the path and into a loose pile beyond the yard. Red worked steadily. Cinnamon Charlie made several enthusiastic sweeps, paused to finish his apple, and then rested his chin on the rake handle.

“About this Indian Summer,” he began.

“What about it?” Little Red Bear responded.

“Does every warm day in Autumn count?”

“Folks sometimes use the name that way,” Little Red Bear explained. “The old understanding is a spell of unusually warm, quiet weather after a stretch of cold, usually after the first frost. Summer weather returning for a little visit after we have begun putting on our jackets.”

Charlie looked toward the woodpile.

“So those warm days before the frost were just Autumn being warm?” he gathered.

“That would be a fair way to put it,” Little Red Bear replied.

“And now?”

“Now we enjoy the extra warm days we have before it gets really cold before heading into Winter,” Little Red Bear explained.

Charlie brightened.

“From the porch?” he asked hopefully.

Little Red Bear pulled another sweep of leaves toward the pile.

“We will get there,” he assured. “Quicker if we are both raking.”

A small insect moved through the sunlight above the grass. Somewhere near the fence, a Cricket called. With more of the branches bare, the woods beyond the cabin seemed to reach farther back than they had a few weeks before.

Charlie could see a length of the old path that had been hidden by undergrowth and trees all Summer.

“You can see clear through to that fallen log now.”

Red nodded.

“It’s a good afternoon for a walk when we finish,” he observed.

Charlie resumed raking.

A walk sounded promising.

Chewy the Grasshopper, meanwhile, had changed his approach.

Abandoning his tiny leaf rake, he had worked his way to the stem of the Catalpa leaf and was pulling it backward. The broad leaf scraped over the grass behind him, catching on nearly everything it passed.

He tugged.

It caught on a twig.

He went back, moved the twig, returned to the stem, and tugged again.

It caught on a clump of grass.

Charlie watched him make another trip around the edge.

“That is a considerable leaf.”

“For Chewy, it is,” Little Red Bear said.

“He could have picked a smaller one.”

“Could have,” Red agreed.

Chewy braced himself and pulled again. The leaf slid forward, then stopped just short of the growing pile.

Cinnamon Charlie took a step toward him.

Chewy pulled again.

Very casually, Cinnamon Charlie lowered his rake behind the leaf and gave the smallest possible nudge.

The huge Catalpa leaf slid onto the others.

Chewy the Grasshopper sat down and wiped his brow.

Charlie looked up at the tree.

“I expect that is the biggest one that Catalpa tree had to offer this year,” he proposed.

A second broad leaf drifted down and landed near his feet.

Charlie studied it.

Little Red Bear kept raking.

After a while, the path began to show again. They cleared the steps and the ground around the woodpile, leaving the leaves beneath the trees and along the woodland edge where they lay.

Cinnamon Charlie was warm now. He set his leaf rake against the fence and stretched.

“If Summer has come back, perhaps Winter will be late,” he speculated.

“Perhaps,” Little Red Bear said. “But I would still rather have the wood stacked now and be ready.”

Cinnamon Charlie looked at the woodpile, then at Little Red Bear.

“You have a way of putting work into a perfectly good conversation,” he asserted.

Little Red Bear smiled.

“And you have a way of putting a conversation into perfectly good work,” he countered.

Cinnamon Charlie picked up his rake.

They finished the last stretch together.

The sunlight had shifted across the yard by the time Little Red Bear straightened and looked over toward the leaf pile.

“Where is Chewy?” he wondered.

Cinnamon Charlie checked beside the steps.

No Chewy.

He looked behind their resting leaf rakes.

No Chewy there, either.

Then he noticed the pale yellow-green heart of the Catalpa leaf.

Chewy the Grasshopper had somehow drug, tugged, and pulled the huge leaf onto and up the pile of gathered leaves, and was reclining comfortably in its shallow curve with his tiny rake laid beside him at the very peak of the pile. Eyes closed and perfectly comfortable.

Cinnamon Charlie stood looking at him.

“He brought his own bedding,” he joked.

Little Red Bear rested both paws on his rake handle.

“He earned a rest hauling that giant leaf,” he added.

“He moved one leaf,” Cinnamon Charlie pointed out.

“But it was quite a leaf,” Little Red Bear added with a laugh.

Charlie glanced at the cleared path, then at Chewy the Grasshopper’s sunny resting place.

“Chewy may have started with too large an assignment,” he observed.

Little Red Bear chuckled and carried their rakes to the porch.

For a few minutes, Little Red Bear and Cinnamon Charlie sat on the porch steps and enjoyed the warmth of the day. The cabin stood ready behind them, the path was clear, and the woodpile was a little easier to reach. Beyond the yard, a Squirrel hurried along a branch with something to put away.

Cinnamon Charlie leaned back on his paws.

“So Indian Summer is a little extra time,” he reasoned.

“A little extra warmth,” Little Red Bear said. “We still have to decide what to do with the afternoon.”

From the top of the leaf pile came a faint, contented rustle and sigh.

Charlie looked over.

“Chewy already decided.”

Till next time then —

Jim (and Red!)

A Little Red Bear P.S. —

There is a good deal to recommend raking leaves on a beautiful Autumn afternoon. Fresh air, warm sunshine, a little exercise, and a friend nearby to visit with while you work.

And when you are finished, you can lean on your rake for a moment and see what you have accomplished. There is something mighty satisfying about that.

Unless you are Chewy the Grasshopper. Then you lie down on what you have accomplished it would appear.

— Red 🐾