November 10, 2015
1274 West 820 North
Provo Utah 84601
My Dear Katrina;
I hope this letter finds you in good health and fine fettle.
I want to tell you a story. It’s called:
LARRY THE LAZY LEAF.
On a large maple tree in a town park there lived Larry and his parents. They were maple leaves, which, if you think about it, makes absolute sense, since why would you expect elm leaves or birch leaves on a maple tree? That would be something like make-believe!
All summer long Larry did nothing but sway back and forth in the warm breezes. When it rained, he curled up under his parents so he wouldn’t get wet. When the squirrels leaped from branch to branch, scratching the tree bark and nibbling at the leaves in an idle, careless way, Larry trembled like . . . well, he trembled like a leaf, and wished the squirrels would go play somewhere else. His parents tried to teach him how to be a good little leaf, and to prepare him for the coming Autumn. But Larry was lazy and didn’t like to learn anything, and he especially didn’t like to listen to his parents.
“Larry” they would say, “you’ve got to pay attention so we can warn you about what will happen to all of us this coming October!”
And Larry would just twirl around and pay them no mind . . .
One day in August, on an especially hot and breathless day, old Mr. Caterpillar crawled onto Larry, took a sniff, decided he didn’t want Larry as a meal, and settled down to read his newspaper, the Caterpillar Argus-Tribune. He had just started the Social Butterfly section when Larry gave a slight shiver and spoke to him.
“Please, Mr. Caterpillar, will you go read your newspaper somewhere else? You’re too heavy for me!”
“Piffle!” replied the old caterpillar. “I weigh nothing at all. You just think because I’ve got so many legs I must weigh a ton. Well, I don’t! And furthermore, I never yet heard of a leaf begrudging a little old caterpillar the space and the time it takes to read the Caterpillar Argus-Tribune.”
But when he saw that Larry was going to start crying, he humphed and hoophed and crawled onto another leaf nearby, which, it turned out, was rather more delicious than Larry, so old Mr. Caterpillar actually ate the whole leaf up. As he was finishing up his leafy meal, the stem of the leaf shouted at Larry “Thanks a lot, you ninnyhammer – now look what your laziness has done!”
And then the hapless leaf was gone, eaten completely up by old Mr. Caterpillar, who gave a contented burp and then crawled away, forgetfully leaving behind his copy of the Caterpillar Argus-Tribune.
“It wasn’t my fault” said Larry to himself sullenly. “It could have happened to any leaf on the tree.”
Well, as you would expect, the summer days came slowly to an end and a chill entered the air. Suddenly it started getting darker earlier and Larry’s parents broke out into several brilliant shades of orange and yellow.
But Larry was too lazy to change colors. He just stayed green. As the night got colder he felt his stem begin to unaccountably loosen.
“Hey, mom and dad” he finally said one bright Fall day, “What’s going on around here? I see some of my friends flying off in the wind and settling down on the grass. And what’s with all these colors and this feeling like my stem is going to give way?”
“Well, Larry, we tried to tell you . . .” began his dad, but just then a puff of wind detached him from the branch and he went sailing away towards the sidewalk. When Larry turned to his mother in horror to find some comfort, he was just in time to see her sailing away on the breeze as well, to land in a trash barrel next to a street lamp.
Larry was now an orphan!
But before he could think too much about that, a very powerful gust of wind shook him so hard that he also left his tree branch, the only home he had ever known, and went flying through the air, going up higher and higher, instead of coming down to land in the park like his parents.
He flew over streets and houses, over canals and factories, until at last he floated lazily down onto the front porch of a very large house with white shutters.
“Well!” thought Larry to himself. “That was quite a ride. I wonder if I can get another ride like that the next time the wind picks up? Maybe I can fly to Franistan or Lippy Land (which are just made-up places; remember that Larry had been too lazy to learn anything about geography when he had the chance).”
As it turned out, Larry actually did get to make another interesting journey, because a little red haired girl named Maisy came out of the front door and saw Larry lying there on her front porch. She squealed in delight.
“Goody! Now I don’t have to go looking for a leaf for my album. There’s one right here. Although it doesn’t look too pretty – it’s kind of a dirty green.”
She picked up Larry and took him inside the house, slamming the door behind her so hard that one of the white shutters fell off into the bushes.
(To Be Continued)
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