“I was staring out my bedroom window one afternoon in late April, looking out upon a beautiful spring day. The grass was the bright green only spring can bring, the trees had fresh new leaves with the buds of flowers just peeking out at the sun, and the flowers in the hedges were slowly waking up to welcome the freshness of spring.”
That is how I started my most recent homework assignment. “What are hedges anyway”, I wondered. We were supposed to write a short story about spring and it was particularly difficult at the moment because what I was writing was not what I was actually seeing. The view outside my bedroom window wasn’t sunny and green but dark, gray and rainy. The trees were blowing in the wind, and their buds weren’t anywhere in sight. It had been an unusually cold spring.
Despite the dreariness I was seeing and feeling, one thing in particular caught my eye just outside my window. However, let me first backup and explain that I live in a rather ordinary house in a rather ordinary neighborhood in the rather ordinary western half of the United States. My family has a typical lawn, a driveway, a decent backyard with a trampoline still covered in fall leaves, and several rather nice looking trees sprinkled here and there.
I am rather fond of all the trees in our yard but I must admit having a favorite. He is an oak tree, tall and strong. His branches are just perfect for climbing, hiding from my annoying sister or taking a courageous nap upon. I have warm memories of the tree house I built on his branches with my dad and of beating my sister to his very top most branches. In my own head I have named him Reginald, it sounded knightly, and he rather reminded me of a knight; tall, proud, courageous and secretive.
However, on this rainy afternoon, Reginald wasn’t looking very much like a knight. He had no new leaves like the other trees and his branches were drooping rather close to the ground. His skin, or I should say bark, was crinkled and darker than I remembered it should have been. As it was raining quite heavily, I made up my mind to check in with Reginald as soon as the rain stopped.
Of course being a ten year old boy, I did not remember anything I made my mind up to do, unless it involved a video game or my computer. Naturally, it was during my next homework assignment, when my mind typically begins to wander to things outside my window, that I remembered Reginald. Nearly a week had passed since I noticed he was looking rather down, and although the rain had stopped and the sun was out, his appearance had not improved in the least.
As I was drawing a complete blank on the countries that Alexander the Great had conquered in his short rule, I decided to take a break and check on my old friend. Leaning over my desk, I opened my bedroom window and felt a nice warm breeze hit my face. How could Reginald be sad on what was actually a very beautiful day?
“Hi ho, Reginald”, I whispered. It wouldn’t do to have my sister hear me, or anyone for that matter, talking to a tree. “Why do you seem so sad? It is spring, and you should be busy making more leaves and acorns. I cannot possibly climb such a sad looking tree this year.” I looked up and down his branches and his trunk, and it seemed to me he sighed heavily. With that sigh, all his branches seemed to droop even lower.
I waited a few moments, giving one of his closer branches an affectionate pat, but as he did not give me any sign of response, I sat back at my desk to tackle the conquests of Alexander the Great. So I continued miserably until the evening when my mom called me down for supper. I was very quick to leave my bedroom, racing down the hall and into the kitchen where the smell of warm chicken casserole greeted me. “Smells amazing, mom!” I said as I slid into my chair at the table. There were four chairs around the table; one for me, my mom, my dad and my sister.
My mom smiled quickly at me, handing me a plate piled high with the casserole that in addition to chicken included peas, carrots and potatoes. It wasn’t my favorite dish in the world but I couldn’t complain. It made it on the top 20 list of best home cooked meals. As I hadn’t eaten anything since lunch time, I dove into my plate voraciously. I didn’t even notice that my dad and mom were talking. I just heard a few words here and there like ‘roots’, ‘foundation’, ‘plumbing’ and ‘cut down’.
I let my mom put some more casserole on my plate, and suddenly realized something was nudging at my elbow. I looked up startled. It was my sister! She never touched me, or looked at me, or even talked to me. She was 13 after all. Yet here she was nudging my elbow and leaning close to whisper. “You do realize what they are talking about, don’t you?” she whispered. “It seems they’ve decided to er… remove Reginald. Apparently his roots are disrupting the plumbing into the house and it is messing up the foundation.”
I stared at her blankly, my fork full of casserole paused in midair on its way to my mouth. How could this be? How could they just remove Reginald? He had been there since before I was born, he was my friend, he kept an eye over me day and night. This was outrageous! My fork clattered down to my plate, and both my parents turned to look at me. “You just can’t,” I sputtered, “you just can’t cut him down!” My mom had a sad but understanding look on her face. “I know, Jimmy, I know he has been with us for many years and he is the only oak tree we have in the yard, but darling, you have to understand. We don’t want to have him removed but he is messing up the house.”
“Not to mention all the leaves I have to rake up every fall, and the branches he drops when the wind picks up. He hasn’t been looking so good these days, I’m concerned he might just fall on the roof with the next big wind that hits here,” my dad said. Then they both smiled at me, and went on with their conversation. On with a conversation that would end the life of my dearest friend. My dearest friend who was clearly not feeling himself, and how could he be if he knew….
That is when the light went on inside of my head. “If he knew,” I thought.
Find the full book on Amazon Kindle!
