Simultaneity.

Of course the leaves are falling. Friday night I went to sleep in the middle of a tempest the likes of which I haven't heard since arriving here: the wind so fierce that I could almost hear the birch trees in the courtyard losing what's left of their yellow leaves. In the morning, the trees were noticeably more bare, and the wind had been so harsh that the leaves hadn't even gathered on the ground; they'd been blown somewhere else altogether. Bit by bit, we're approaching winter.

Yet today I found a new set of trees that are flowering--and I think that these might be cherry trees. Crocuses bloom along the Avenue leading to Trinity. A house on the way to my piano teacher's has snapdragons in its yard.

More significant, though, is the fact that willow trees apparently start getting ready for their new leaves even as they're losing their old ones. At least, that's how I interpret what I saw from Trinity Bridge this afternoon, before the porter in his bowler hat started to talk to me.