When the screen faded to black at the end of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows there was an audible protest from the audience. The fact that a packed house sat still for 146 minutes and begged for more when the credits rolled is probably the best recommendation I can give.

But they pay me to write more than a paragraph.

I can still hear my mom’s voice: Go outside and play, but be back for dinner. The street where I grew up was surrounded by woods. A dirt trail — a remnant of a 10-mile, horse-drawn, streetcar track — cut through the woods and gave me hours of outdoor magical fun.

I was a free-range kid. Chances are if you are over 50, you were too.

In the fall, I hate to see black plastic bags full of leaves lining streets. Next spring, I’m likely to see empty bags of mulch, peat moss and fertilizer waiting to be collected by the solid waste municipal workers. Of all the 42 years that I have owned a home in Maryland, I have never discarded leaves. Nor have I ever purchased a bag of mulch.

Dear Bay Weekly:

My husband and I were fishing out on the Bay near the Eastern Shore on Sunday Nov. 14. We started noticing little spiders all over the boat. Then we saw spider webs on the rods and on the radio antenna. Then when the sun was just right, we saw hundreds of long spider webs floating in the air with the current. Some were up to 30 feet long. It was fascinating. Some of the spiders just fell right out of the sky. One landed on my husband’s head.