The Corner Lot Quandry

This morning as I stuck my head out the front door to take in the morning air I was surprised to see a pair of socks with a complimentary pair of Fruit of the Looms on my lawn. The surprise was followed immediately by shock: how could things of that nature possibly find themselves on my grass?

That, my friends, is but the latest example of what can be discovered as the result of living on a corner lot next to something of a major road, a four lane one way street. The direction of the street is towards my house, driving, if you'll forgive the pun I myself could not resist, various articles right onto our property. So I am not surprised to find interesting or unusual items out front.

Many interesting things have appeared here since we bought the house in 1981. We have found a Transformers t-shirt and a cowboy-like suede jacket, the kind with the long tassel fringe down the arms and sides. Boots have found their way under our cars. There have even been cans of food and more than a couple of bucks worth of returnable bottles and cans, though I must imagine they were left after being inadvertently dropped rather than wind driven onto our lot. Some of the bottles were undoubtedly left behind by someone who had drank just a little too much and left because they were forgotten or, perhaps, too much of a nuisance to carry further. This is before we even get to the normal sort of trash, leaves and old lottery tickets and papers and the like, which naturally enough find their way to most any home front yet are particularly fond of street-corner abodes.

Plastic bags seem quite fond of us. They scurry, wind blown, over our fence only to find themselves soon trapped upon the inside, forced to cling against the wooden slats with no hope of ever again gaining the freedom of the outside world. Their harsh snapping sounds as they vainly attempt escape are actually eerily forlorn, especially in the dead of winter.

Mu wife did once find half of a robin's egg. We have since hoped that it meant a young bird was safe in a tree above. As no mourning avian creatures were found, we happily presume that to have been the case.

I took a pair of gloves and an inside out bag and gingerly picked up the clothes items from the lawn this morning, taking them immediately to our dumpster en route to the Detroit incinerator as the fuel for the fire they surely deserve to be. I will watch the front grass all the more closely now for the interesting things she will undoubtedly catch for me in the coming days. I will then wonder what may have brought them to us.

Except for Fruit of the Looms. Sorry, Aristotle, but there are certain bits knowledge not worth holding.