Leaves

Im not sure when I started to notice the leaves. Maybe walking my son to school. Maybe on bush-walks where for those blissful hours you forget your mobile phone exists. The leaves scattered on the pathways and down the gullies of fire-trails. Maybe because they always blow into our entranceway of our home and I have to clean them up. The eternal fight I have with four gums at the front of our property. The leaves are ever present on our home. Ever invading.

For some strange reason, especially after the rain, the gum tree leaves develop bizarrely beautiful patterns and colours. Each one a unique little gumtree snowdrop. A little surprise hidden in something that feels like a repeated pattern.

I tell myself that it’s probably a fungus eating away at the leaves. But the patterns are so different that that does not seem correct.

I tell my son that it is tree fairies who’s magic transforms each leaf and imbues it with special powers that only he can find and use.

My son tells me about Minecraft. He is less interested in the leaves.

Stink bug babies and eggs on a citrus leaf