All the falling leaves filling up shopping bags.

Over the course of the dearly departed 2004-2005 school year, I defined the word "symbolism" to my ESL students as "the practice of using a visible image as a shortcut to represent an abstract concept or idea". For example, a circle with a plus sign underneath it can be symbolic of women, a stylized fish can be symbolic of Christianity, or the number 13 can be symbolic of Mexican-born gang members. Or, a flag can be symbolic of a country.

I didn't get too far into the idea that language itself is a series of symbols just as subjective as any flag, and that the difference between a word and what it describes is enormous, because -- well, frankly, I was too busy trying to keep them from throwing paper airplanes. But they were 13-year-old Latinos. The idiots who put so much energy into making flag-burning a crime have no excuse. Certainly no more, and probably a good deal less, than the idiots who do the burning.

A first-rate illustration on the dangers of blind attachment to symbols is hereby commended to their, and your, attention. Meanwhile, the shopping bags keep filling up with falling leaves. Goddamnit.