Timmmberrrr

I've been dreading this week.



Our hemlock in the back of the house had to come down.

I resisted it with all my being, but I did not prevail. It was too close to the house and swaying into the gutter and roofline with just about every breeze.

We consulted with several arborists to see if it could be cabled or pulled away from the roof somehow, but they all said no. Let me tell you I loved that tree. It provided wonderful afternoon shade to the little deck where we always sit and gave me a handy place to feed my critters even when the weather's bad, not to mention it was always a pleasure to sit and watch the birds and squirrels run and play in its branches. But it had to go.

So the crew arrived bright and early and proceded to cut down my tree.

They reminded me of evil gremlins who climbed out the chimney to steal my tree.

I watched as they hacked off limb after limb and then ground them up horribly in their big woodchipper. Oh, it was painful. Slowly, the climber man inched his way up, up to the sky until he reached the very top and then--No!--it was all gone.

Now it feels naked out there and way too hot and sunny in the afternoon.

It didn't take the critters long to adapt though.

Goodbye old friend. Thanks for the memories.

Heeere's Hanna

After toying with us all day with periods of light rain and no wind, Hanna seems to have arrived now around dinner time. The rain is pelting down in force and the trees are swaying pretty hard. The news just predicted a tornado warning for a few surrounding counties, but not ours, thank goodness. One they did mention was Beverly in New Jersey which is where Chris lives. He is not there, however. He's on the beach at Sea Isle. Great.

I called him last night to suggest he wait until tomorrow, but no, he had to "get outa Dodge." Nut. We've watched some pretty severe storms from that window on the ocean and they were scary. I'm just praying now that he and Shannon and the puppies and whoever else is with them will be all right.

Irresistible Running Mates

You have to be a Battlestar Galactica fan to appreciate this, but I am and I do.
And it's just perfect.

Treehouse Day

Tyler Arboretum is having a treehouse exhibit this summer, and we rode over the other day to see it. Nothing as elaborate as the Longwood treehouses, but imaginative and clever just the same. Like Longwood's, these treehouses do no structural damage to the trees themselves.

Signs throughout the exhibit which winds all over the arboretum tell how trees enrich our lives by providing food, shelter, beauty and inspiration to people.

One of my favorites was "Nesting," built from about 8,000 wooden dowels and thousands of plastic zip ties that look like giant nests hanging in the tree limbs. Look closely to see the large blue nest hanging behind the orange nest.

Birds do this on a smaller scale all the time. They gather twigs, pine needles and feathers and then weave them all together to make their nests. You obviously cannot go up into this, any more than you would disturb a real nest in the trees.

Another one I liked a lot was "Hanging Out." In this one, you are invited to lounge in the hammocks inside a grove of trees and just daydream.

The "Cape May Bluebird House" was cute. It was built to resemble a little Victorian Cape May house and kids were running in and out of this one. They had several real nesting boxes around this but, with the amount of traffic and general busyness at the site, I don't imagine they got many feathered takers.

I was also taken with "The Bell House" where they had cowbells attached to cords up in the branches that you could pull on to make music. When people weren't ringing the bells, the wind would do it.


At one spot on the trail, they provided something like a duck blind where you stood on a platform and looked through a slit cut into the front which directed your gaze to this. . . a magnificent tree.


The large meadow in the center of the arboretum was lovely this time of year with all the mature grasses and wildflowers.

This is just a small sample of all the treehouses on view, too many for one post.

It was a good day and a good walk and lots of fun to see.

Nice Duds

This is a line-up of kindergarteners on their first day of school in the Pottstown School District. Notice anything particular about them? They look pretty cute, don't they? That might be because they are wearing their uniforms. Pottstown has decreed that all K-8 students must wear uniforms to school. This is the first year they are instituting this policy. The uniforms are pretty flexible. Khaki or blue shorts, pants, or skirts and blue or white shirts or tops. No flipflops or jellies. No restrictions on where you buy these clothes. You can go to K-Mart or Nordstroms. In fact, the district is even arranging some funds to subsidize parents on a tight budget.

The rationale behind this move is to lessen the amount of teasing and peer pressure that kids, presumably without designer labels on their clothes or the latest hot fashion item, go through. I can also see it as a benefit for parents whose kids have a tough time choosing what to wear each day. It seems to me it takes the emphasis off clothes and allows the kids to get on with the business of getting to school.

Some parents are objecting because they say it stifles creativity. I have seen some of the creative choices walking around the streets and I would counter that maybe it will promote better taste and open up other avenues for personal creativity.

Next year they are extending it to the high school students. Good luck with that.

The Case Of The Mysterious Painting

Where's Miss Marple when you need her? Here's what I found yesterday when I walked out to pick up the newspaper. This green trash bag leaning against the mailbox post with a tag on it with Bill's name. Not just his first and last name, mind you. Not just "Bill" and his last name, but his complete first, middle and last name. (Incidentally, I just noticed it looks like we need a new mailbox, but that's another story).

Anyway, I thought "what the . . .", but I picked it up and brought it inside. It was obviously something framed. Not too heavy, wood frame. . .a painting perhaps? My powers of deduction almost rival the great Miss Marple herself. But why leave it leaning against the mailbox? Not even on the front porch. Huh?

So I left it in the kitchen for him to find and went out on my errands. Sure enough, when I got back he asked me eagerly, "where did the painting come from?" "I dunno," I said eruditely, "it was just leaning against the mailbox."

"I just can't understand it," he said. "This is a painting of the horses I used to visit when I was a kid. These horses boarded during the summer at the old Black Horse Inn near our house and I'd go down there to see them and pet them and feed them. Where could this possibly have come from?"

The tag hanging from the bag had his name on one side and on the other it read:

Coo Coo, Tex and Butterball: the names of the horses he loved. And these are the very horses in the painting. There is a framer's label on the back, but when he tried to contact them, they were long out of business. So this painting has been somewhere for many, many years until someone decided to give it to Bill. Anonymously. He is really touched, but he wants to solve the mystery. He has one glimmer of an idea of who it might be who would know about him and the horses, but it's a long shot. If he figures it out or if Miss Marple shows up to help, I'll let you know.

Summer Afternoon

Summer afternoon - Summer afternoon... the two most

beautiful words in the English language.

Henry James

British (US -born) author (1843 - 1916)