Evening star., 1924-07-08
THIS AND THAT
BY C. e. TRAcEwELL.

Our alley is much more interesting
than our street 3i
1t has a personal air the street
lacks. The latter is spick and span,
perfectly proper, neat and trim, but
it lacks personality. nj
Our alley oozes personality. =!
1t bristles defiance at the passing
world, showing once and for ALI
something of the people that live
! there. 1t is not impersonal, like the
street. II
/ AS matter OF fact, the alley Is
paved and the street is not, so the
former already has the edge" on
the latter in the mere matter Of
physique.
But the paving is the least of its
merits: Asphalt makes il easier for
! the ash man. the trash man and the
carnage man, worthy minions of the
municipal government Sometimes,
when they throw the cans down too
| hard. one is tempted to feel they are
not SO worthy, after all, but dares not
say what he thinks.
| say word" the trash man seems
70 threaten; Just say one word and
Ill smash your darn old can to pieces
| on the next trip"
so nobody says anything in our alley
Our alley is twenty feet wide.
sloped SO TO the west that the rains
run in a veritable torrent down the
neat w" which is its center.
Bordering it are the back fences,
the low kind that is replacing the ia
nous old high back fences, long the
subject of comment. song and drama
III the high fence is a thing of the
past, maybe it is too bad, maybe it
is good. All depends on your mem
cries.
If you ask the cats, however, there
Will be unanimous vote in favor Of
the old board fences A respectable
tomcat that has never prowled along
nigh board fence has missed some
thing in life, 1 have it on high au-
thority from my feline friends.
80 much for the physical aspects of
the alley. They are but the letter.
The spirit lies in the men and the
women, their children, their dogs and
cats, their flowers and vegetables all
those mysterious beings who live
there, and make the alley what it is.
For the dogs live there as much as
their masters, and SO do the cats and
MOWERS and even the vegetables Each
is a living thing. The new flowers
and vegetables. indeed, are the fresh
est things from the hands of the
master craftsman. Every new spear
OF grass is a tribute to the "everiast-
ing arms" spoken of thousands and
thousands of years ago in one of the
very Oldest orations extant.
So 1t is the living being and things,
then, that makes our alley what it is.
This is particularly so in the spring
time. even such wet spring as We
had this year, so backward, so dreary,
SO unappealing to most
Ask of the sweet peas climbing on
their strings, give ear, if you can, to
the song of the just blooming roses.
and you will hear something like
this:
What a wonderful place of light
this is.
Surely this must be the spring of
which our ancestors told US.
Down from the first seed they have
whispered tales of the light.
Il am child Of darkness, shut UP in
tiny space, but 1 have possibilities
Il was such a speck. so dark and lit
tie. when l was put down in the ground
They did not dream, nor did /.
scarcely, that l would ever make my
way into the world like this
But here l am, and this is spring
The old seeds sung il ; now l know that
what they said is true.
They sang Of the light and the sun
and the rain and the green. l see the
light. There is green and there is rain.
Il will wait for the sum-"
In our alley the birds are noisy every
morning.
Some Of them chatter so the cats can
not refrain from gnashing their teeth
at them. The cats fairly chatter at
them like monkeys.
Two fat robins hit a telephone wire
with a resounding swish. They stick
tight, while the wire vibrates to its
whole length. swaying as if to shake
the birds off.
Atop a telephone pole a blackbird
takes its morning survey. AT exactly 6
o'clock each morning the bird takes its
post.
Somewhere a whippoorwill sings its
long-drawn notes. 1t is not every neigh
borhood that has whippoorwill.
The spring was a time of great
digging. raking, planting, sprinkling.
painting.
The yards were dug up and planted
to grass seed. In few short weeks
in many yards there was a green
sward, fresh in the morning dew
You will find every treatment of
yard there. Some have gone in for
simplicity, while others have spent
much time on more orante treat
ments, such as rock paths and slate
lined walks.
Each to his fancy. Was it not
Terrence who said, so many men, so
many opinions? And Horace, worthy
Roman: "All men do not, in fine, ad-
mire or love the same thing"
But, I'VE hardly find any persons of
good sense save those who agree with
us" So each family sticks to its
own yard, and no doubt has other
things to say. in private. than the
neighborly pleasantries passed over back
fence.