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Trees Are Our Friends, But They Are Not Perfect

    Hey, everyone. I've been thinking about trees a lot. It's hard not to think about them, here in the green retreat. When I was living in Kansas for a few years I really missed trees. There were almost none. In the summer they help cut the light bill with their shade. Then in the winter they lose their leaves so the sun can warm us and cut the light bill. Of course I cut the dead trees for firewood. There are enough trees that die every year so that I don't have to cut living ones. It makes me feel good to do this from a conservation standpoint.
    How cool is it that trees take in bad air and put out good air? They give us really neat colors in the fall and give the poets something else to write about. They are pretty awesome when you cut one down and they crash like a bomb when they hit the ground. They have different smells when you burn them, too. You can burn a stick of mountain laurel and it's like perfume, it puts a sweet aroma in the house. Dogwood and hickory put off a lot of heat, as does oak. Pine burns up faster, likes to pop sparks onto your carpet and won't hardly heat your house on a colder night.
    I know it sounds spacey but one day I laid my hand on a tree and I could feel it's strength. Amazing the power of those things. They are layered and fibered, very tough. Not only that but they can't even lie about their age like we do. The rings 'rat them out', even telling about dry years. I suppose the lines in our faces tell about hard times in a similar fashion.
    What really got me into the tree thing today is their production. Year round they are producing stuff. Acorns, my goodness, the acorns. This year is the fewest we've seen, but there have been years we've shoveled them up and put them in big garbage cans to drag back out into the woods. Leaves by bushels. Climb on the roof to get them off. By the way, go to Home Depot and get these plastic strips for your gutters that will let water through but allow the wind to blow the leaves off. They're cheap and they work great.
    Every good wind talks the trees into dropping sticks. In the spring you have things called catkins which drop everywhere and dump pollen. Sap coats your cars and the acorns put some dints in them, also. Dead or alive they are like a recreation center for squirrels, worms, ants, birds, ticks and hickory nuts. Sometimes I'll be sitting on the deck and a worm will appear before my eyes as he repels down like Tom Cruise on a strand of some material that is so tenuous I can barely see it. Another neat thing I see from trees is something I've made up a name for because I don't know what they are. Forgive the gross name but I call them tree boogers. I don't know if they are by-products from worms or little round particles of bark, but they are like dust when you crush them.
    At any rate, I find myself sweeping the deck almost every day; but even so I love my trees. A lady told my wife, "I'd be unable to sleep here. I'd be afraid a tree would fall on the house." I've thought about it, I admit. But when the north wind blows in the winter I like to hear it moan in the tree tops. I remember one morning around dawn when hurricane Katrina, or what was left of her, came through. The wind snapped an oak right at a knothole and laid it on the ground fifteen feet from where we slept. The oak was big enough that it would take two people to reach around it. Hey, it kept us warm for a month or so as we burned it.
    Well, I could ramble about trees all day so I will shut up now. Thanks for reading about the mighty inhabitants of the green retreat, the trees.
CE Wills

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