“And They Cut Down The ‘Old’ Pine Tree, TIMBER!”

The object of this post happens to be the cute little pine tree just to the right of Marci and Jamie in this picture taken eight years ago on the occasion of Marci teaching Jamie to ride her bike.  Every day, as Jamie and I had walked Marci to the school bus stop, we had passed this little tree sitting unplanted behind someone’s back fence.  When we finally asked the lady that lived there what her plans for the tree were, she said they had no room for the tree and would love to get rid of it.   We decided to adopt the little pine, and called it Marci’s tree because it was about her height.

The cute little pine tree was very happy out front and grew and grew, but after only eight short years it wasn’t so cute any more.  It sort of took over the whole front yard and wasn’t very good about sharing with the other trees that were struggling to get what they needed.  The time had come to say “goodbye.”

Jim was just thrilled Saturday morning when he learned what was on his agenda for the day.  He was even more thrilled when he finally got his chain saw working and found that it was too dull to cut the wood and that it would take a week to get it sharpened.  His delight increased when he couldn’t find the axe, realized both hatchets couldn’t cut butter and all he had to work with was a buck saw that kept getting “stuck” in the tree.  (He had a more technical term, but I can’t remember what it was.)  Nevertheless, this is a man that doesn’t give up easily.

After taking off a lot of the lower branches, he and Devin worked it out so that while one worked the saw, the other would hang on the tree making it easier for the saw to cut through the wood. 

I might add that this is a good workout for a 50-plus-year-old man, as it uses many muscle groups that don’t normally get used.

“TIMBER!!!”

Then came the fun part of  the song where “they hauled it away to the mill.”  They had to cut off all the branches, then cut the tree into firewood lengths that we could store to use next year when we go camping.

If you look at his face upside down, the grimace turns into a very big smile.

I already know what kind of tree I would like to replace the pine with, but we won’t talk about that until someone’s sore muscles aren’t complaining any more and this all becomes a fond memory.