i try to recall the days when it may have evoked a comfortable feeling of predictability ; but now i find it too obscure a memory , too distant and tainted ; i stare at it in an attempt to make it real -- the sharp green hedges and sleek white fences marking boundaries , lush and blossoming fruit trees dropping petals and spotting well-manicured lawns , tall stemmed dahlias top heavy and leaning against sides of chimneys like frail birds , miniature roses thorny and blood-red languishing on trellises , sharp gleaming metal of bikes and scooters and pogo sticks tipped onto their sides , stray balls adrift , rolling along like tumbleweeds in some phantom breeze .