In a good mate’s shed…

This cooler weather isn’t too hard … It’s the wind that gets to me… I just cleared the courtyard and it now has a carpet of gold, red and green, as the persimmon tree sheds it’s leaves. I wouldn’t mind if they were like the liquid amber at the front and the leaves would decompose quickly or break up once they were walked on. Unfortunately they don’t break up for ages…

©Crissouli

All the liquid amber leaves get raked into the garden, they make the best mulch. Well, that’s if HRH doesn’t get a burst of enthusiasm and pile them into the bin. (Someone has been known to tip them out again. 😇 )

The tree at Sunnybank only has half the amount of leaves but Dad used to bag them up and give them away to a couple of ladies who came every autumn to collect them. Mum gave me mine when it was only a 15cm seedling, so I sent it back with her to raise to at least 30cm… hate to think how tall it is now. It’s a pain with all that drops onto the roof…but the ‘carpet’ that it gives is wonderful..

This weather reminds me of a picnic we had in a farmer’s shed, up near Thora… Mum and Dad, my brother, me … in the old De Soto, Uncle Dave, Uncle Harry, Aunt Mary and Uncle Herb in the Customline… The day had started off absolutely beautiful… but it got quite cool and then windy, with rain promising. We had blankets and all the food in baskets, thermoses of hot water, even a teapot (of course) and so much food. We drove towards the Thora Bridge at the base of Dorrigo mountain, but couldn’t find any shelter. Uncle Dave motioned Dad to pull over and asked Dad to follow him as he ‘had a mate’ that had orange trees and a big shed right near the road. He convinced Dad that the farmer wouldn’t worry if we used his shed…so off we went, following him. Within a short time, Uncle Dave pulled up beside a huge shed, almost a barn, that only had three walls.. perfect.. except for one minor thing… it was on the other side of a fence. No problem for two out of three Catsoulis boys… but not quite as easy for Mum, Aunt Mary, Uncles Herb and Harry.. my brother and I got through the fence ok and we’d passed everything over. Just as we set out everything, it started to pour rain…

We were very glad we were in shelter… till a cow wandered in, followed by a farmer on a very old tractor. I’m not sure who got the biggest shock. The cow didn’t mind too much…The farmer ‘asked’ what we were doing there… Uncle Dave jumped up and started to explain … surprisingly, the farmer didn’t know him from Adam. Luckily he had a generous streak and just asked that we didn’t leave any mess and gracefully accepted a scone from Aunt Mary… and he returned not long after with a bag of oranges ‘for the kiddies’… It took Uncle Dave quite a while to live down the story of his ‘mate’s shed’.

©Crissouli Sept 2019

* Not ‘the’ shed.. courtesy of   Bluedawe – Own work

Abandoned machinery shed, Maldon NSW Australia    CC BY-SA 3.0