Our Giving Tree

The month of May was wet. Very, very wet. There were a handful of days without rain, but even those days were so humid and moist that nothing dried. The Mosquitos were awful. Gavin lost many days of outside recess. Our backyard was ridiculously muddy. A real swamp at times. It was hard on everyone, but no one in our family felt it more than our beloved shade tree. Our tree from which our boys would swing, our tree that shaded the entire yard, our tree that gave our master bed and bath privacy, our climbing tree that Casey thoughtfully nailed steps to so our boys and friends could independently reach her cradle.

Despite knowing that our tree was approaching the end of her life cycle, Casey still made plans. He planned a treetop perch that would connect to the fort. We pondered a zip line.

We loved our tree, but feared her at the same time, for her biggest limbs hung over our roof.

During one of the particularly nasty tornado producing storms, we heard strong winds and a snap that sent all of us to Gavin and Sawyer's bathtub. As the storm passed, we looked out the back door and knew she had been fatally injured. Our swinging branch had been amputated, leaving the remaining tree limbs in a precarious state with more storms forecasted.

The next day, between storms, Casey and Gavin went to work sawing branches and clearing brush. About a week later what was left of our Giving Tree was cut down to a low sad stump, leaving our backyard scarred and very very sunny.