Avocet of Shadow

It rained hard all night, and in the morning, the lawns and sidewalks were thickly patterned with fallen leaves. This week, the Unitarians were meeting at the other synagogue--the Reformed one, rather than the Conservative one where we usually rent space. A wedding was happening there, and the family wanted the building all to themselves for pictures and preparations. I wanted to attend this morning, because I was curious to see what the big, fancy synagogue was like, and because it's a nice walk from our house. In theory, we could walk to the Conservative synagogue as well, but it's on a busy street that doesn't really have a safe place for pedestrians, so we don't. We enjoyed hiking over there in the wet, windy morning, The interior is bright with natural wood and gilding. The architect was Erich Mendelsohn, and he is quite famous! I had no idea! Our pianist had a grand piano to play rather than our usual humble electric one, and he sounded very grand indeed.

When we got home, we went out and bought Halloween candy . . . sooo much Halloween candy. I hope there are a lot of hungry ghosts in our neighborhood this year. By that time, the sun had come out, and it was a beautiful fall day. I craved the sunlight, and there were leaves all over our lawn, so I went out and raked until I ran out of gas, filling four compost bags. There are still many iterations of leaf fall to come, but at least I made a start on it.