I called out to a boy as he walked to school who I know loves baseball: “Are you a Cubs fan?”
“Last night I was!” he said, bouncing along.
It was a warm autumn morning, still dark, with air still heavy with night moisture and soft winds. As I drove along, all the leaves began their descent, and later, as I walked to my office, I reached out my hand and caught a dark brown leaf like I would have as a child.
Some students passing by smiled and laughed as if they, too, remembered that catching a falling leaf meant a wish comes true.
And I was thinking about the Country Music Awards last night and how everyone cried when Randy Travis sang out that “Amen!” I thought of everyone singing along to Alabama and Reba and all the old songs of my childhood. I thought of how Nashville welcomed Taylor Swift and the Dixie Chicks and Beyoncé.
It was a good morning to think of celebrating a kind of togetherness as the leaves fell down upon us all.