Leaves

Fall in Seattle is gorgeous.
I know you're thinking, what could be attractive about drippy gray days, where the streetlights glow all day like giant night lights, and you feel the damp chill deep in your sinuses?
I have one word for you: leaves.
You have to love a thing that is named for its behavior. In the fall, a leaf--well--it leaves.
Seattle's silvery gray autumn light makes the changing leaves light up, illuminates them as though each one is a little lamp. The leaves on the tree outside my window are a riot of golds and yellows and peaches. At dusk, they become a sunburst of light against the surrounding gray-green cedars. Our maples turn a deep ruby red, as intense as pomegranate seeds, or aged port.
This morning as I was out walking the dog in the cold dark mist, I spotted this leaf, a brilliant yellow, bedazzled with raindrops, plastered against the sequiny black pavement.