A Day at the Pumpkin Patch

            With the start of fall arriving my friend Sarah prompted the idea of going to a pumpkin patch.  I was hesitant about the idea since I had not been to a pumpkin patch since I was in elementary school.  I remembered the trips we used to take to the pumpkin patch every year in Montrose, Michigan.  My mother owned a daycare center and I remember the anticipation we all felt sitting in the back seat of the minivan on the drive there.  We knew our day would be filled with picking apples, and a pumpkin to later carve, getting homemade doughnuts, seeing the cider mill, and our absolute favorite, the wagon ride through the orchard.  The wagon ride went through a trail that had different scenes made out of pumpkins.  I distinctly remember the scene of pirates, the Disney scene, the Scooby-Doo scene, and different fairytale scenes.  In remembering all the excitement I felt as a child I decided it was a trip that was needed to get in the spirit of the fall season.  We headed out to the apple orchard on Gull Road in full excitement. 

            I felt like a small child revisiting these old memories as I jumped out of the minivan I now own, that I recall sitting in the back of year after year going to this joyous event.  It was a brisk, autumn day and I noticed the leaves beginning to change to a burnt orange on the trees surrounding us.  We decided our first stop in our day would be to jump on the wagon ride.   To be honest, this wagon ride was completely different and boring compared to the one I remember going on at Montrose Apple Orchard.  Granted there were not any pumpkin scenes, and I was ten years older, but I was completely unsatisfied with the ride.  Although the excitement was nowhere near what I felt as a child, I did spend the time in the wagon ride looking at the leaves changing and the corn fields that surrounded us.  We spent the other parts of our day eating homemade doughnuts and cider, picking our pumpkins we later carved, going through the corn maze, but the most significant part of the day was this wagon ride.  It was relaxing just to have this twenty minute ride to appreciate the changes in nature around us that would be staying for some time.