Suddenly Spectacular

     “Please tell the girl who saw the purple tree that now it’s time to look for pink ones,” I texted our daughter, who teaches elementary school music.  One of her young charges showed up with clear evidence of having been crying, recently, and this was not a child given to tears.  It seemed the girl had noticed a tree that, in its autumn splendor, was purple.  She had marveled over it and thought it so wonderful she had to share the news with her classmates. 

     And they didn’t believe her.  They told her she was making it up, and some of them mocked her.  By the time that group of students arrived in the music classroom, the girl was wretched. 

     “She’s lying!” kids jeered.  “She said she saw a purple tree!”

     “You mean, like this?” asked our daughter, whipping out her phone and pulling up an image of a Crimson King maple, which she showed the class. 

     “Yes!” said the little girl, whose day had just done a complete turnaround for the better.  “Just like that.”

     Our daughter gets so many non-music-related questions that, last week, she asked one of her classes, “What do you do?  Save up your questions to ask me?”  The kids replied that, in fact, they did.  Whereupon, she asked them, “Why?”

     “Because you know the answers,” they said, as if the matter were self-evident.

     “Not always,” she countered.

     “If you don’t know, you look it up,” came the response.  End of discussion. 

     Back to the purple tree.  The girl definitely saw one.  And now truly is the time to look for pink ones.  Pink tree season started yesterday.  This autumn had been okay as Michigan autumns go, although, of course, pretty great by other standards.  Yesterday, it was suddenly spectacular. 

     My first hint came yesterday morning, when I glanced outside while standing at the kitchen sink.  I’ve done that thousands and thousands of times over the decades.  This time, though, there was a red hot air balloon in Janice’s back yard.  That’s what I thought.  I didn’t wonder, what could that be in Janice’s back yard.  Nope, the hot-air-balloon thought arrived fully formed.

     We’re talking saturated, Crayola-crayon red, here, clearly the product of human hand.  Only parts of the balloon were visible, the rest obscured by trees, but it was clearly enormous.  The only things I’ve ever seen that were that red and that big have been hot air balloons, and there was one right now in Janice’s yard.  Except, of course, it wasn’t.  It wasn’t even in Janice’s back yard.  It was beyond her house, and it was a stunner of a maple.

     This neighborhood has a few maples that always lead the rest in color and brilliance.  As of Tuesday, all the other maples are vying with them.  The mountain maples, in particular, are an amazing pink, and there are a lot of them around here, both cultivated and wild.  Purple trees are rare.  If that little girl noticed one of those, she should have no trouble finding pink ones.

     The non-maples are pretty wonderful, too.  In its quest for variety among its street trees, the city of Ann Arbor has planted yellowwoods here and there around town, including near us.  The trees are named for their yellow-hued wood, but this fall, the leaves are stop-to-look-at-them yellow.  Not golden yellow.  Yellow yellow.  What a treat.  Deciduous tree colors this fall go pretty much around the color wheel, except for blue.  Add conifers, and you pick up some blue as well.  Add flowers and grasses, and the wheel is complete.

     Rain started this afternoon and is expected to continue off and on over the weekend.  We’re not ready for the autumn show to be over, but soon we’ll have a frost, and those colors will be airborne.  Which has a beauty of its own, of course.

     Charles Gayley wrote of it when he composed the University of Michigan’s alma mater in 1886:  “Sing to the colors that float in the light; / Hurrah for the Yellow and Blue! / Yellow the stars as they ride through the night / And reel in a rollicking crew; / Yellow the field where ripens the grain / And yellow the moon on the harvest wane. / Hail! / Hail to the colors that float in the light; / Hurrah for the Yellow and Blue!”  

     The stars are reeling and rollicking in the Orionids meteor shower tonight, but we won’t be able to see them due to the rain.  Weather won’t stop the football spectacular on Saturday, though:  Michigan versus Michigan State.  Of such stuff are memories made.  Go Blue!

20 October 2023

     “Please tell the girl who saw the purple tree that now it’s time to look for pink ones,” I texted our daughter, who teaches elementary school music.  One of her young charges showed up with clear evidence of having been crying, recently, and this was not a child given to tears.  It seemed the girl had noticed a tree that, in its autumn splendor, was purple.  She had marveled over it and thought it so wonderful she had to share the news with her classmates. 

     And they didn’t believe her.  They told her she was making it up, and some of them mocked her.  By the time that group of students arrived in the music classroom, the girl was wretched. 

     “She’s lying!” kids jeered.  “She said she saw a purple tree!”

     “You mean, like this?” asked our daughter, whipping out her phone and pulling up an image of a Crimson King maple, which she showed the class. 

     “Yes!” said the little girl, whose day had just done a complete turnaround for the better.  “Just like that.”

     Our daughter gets so many non-music-related questions that, last week, she asked one of her classes, “What do you do?  Save up your questions to ask me?”  The kids replied that, in fact, they did.  Whereupon, she asked them, “Why?”

     “Because you know the answers,” they said, as if the matter were self-evident.

     “Not always,” she countered.

     “If you don’t know, you look it up,” came the response.  End of discussion. 

     Back to the purple tree.  The girl definitely saw one.  And now truly is the time to look for pink ones.  Pink tree season started yesterday.  This autumn had been okay as Michigan autumns go, although, of course, pretty great by other standards.  Yesterday, it was suddenly spectacular. 

     My first hint came yesterday morning, when I glanced outside while standing at the kitchen sink.  I’ve done that thousands and thousands of times over the decades.  This time, though, there was a red hot air balloon in Janice’s back yard.  That’s what I thought.  I didn’t wonder, what could that be in Janice’s back yard.  Nope, the hot-air-balloon thought arrived fully formed.

     We’re talking saturated, Crayola-crayon red, here, clearly the product of human hand.  Only parts of the balloon were visible, the rest obscured by trees, but it was clearly enormous.  The only things I’ve ever seen that were that red and that big have been hot air balloons, and there was one right now in Janice’s yard.  Except, of course, it wasn’t.  It wasn’t even in Janice’s back yard.  It was beyond her house, and it was a stunner of a maple.

     This neighborhood has a few maples that always lead the rest in color and brilliance.  As of Tuesday, all the other maples are vying with them.  The mountain maples, in particular, are an amazing pink, and there are a lot of them around here, both cultivated and wild.  Purple trees are rare.  If that little girl noticed one of those, she should have no trouble finding pink ones.

     The non-maples are pretty wonderful, too.  In its quest for variety among its street trees, the city of Ann Arbor has planted yellowwoods here and there around town, including near us.  The trees are named for their yellow-hued wood, but this fall, the leaves are stop-to-look-at-them yellow.  Not golden yellow.  Yellow yellow.  What a treat.  Deciduous tree colors this fall go pretty much around the color wheel, except for blue.  Add conifers, and you pick up some blue as well.  Add flowers and grasses, and the wheel is complete.

     Rain started this afternoon and is expected to continue off and on over the weekend.  We’re not ready for the autumn show to be over, but soon we’ll have a frost, and those colors will be airborne.  Which has a beauty of its own, of course.

     Charles Gayley wrote of it when he composed the University of Michigan’s alma mater in 1886:  “Sing to the colors that float in the light; / Hurrah for the Yellow and Blue! / Yellow the stars as they ride through the night / And reel in a rollicking crew; / Yellow the field where ripens the grain / And yellow the moon on the harvest wane. / Hail! / Hail to the colors that float in the light; / Hurrah for the Yellow and Blue!”  

     The stars are reeling and rollicking in the Orionids meteor shower tonight, but we won’t be able to see them due to the rain.  Weather won’t stop the football spectacular on Saturday, though:  Michigan versus Michigan State.  Of such stuff are memories made.  Go Blue!

20 October 2023