
Many of my readers may have read posts about the small wooded lot behind our yard, and one tree in particular we nicknamed Treebeard after a character in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. When we moved here in 2017, the lofty pine was still very much alive. His majestic capturing of the sunset light made for many photo opportunities from the comfort of my own back deck.

Alas, Treebeard, scarred by a lightning strike years before our arrival, succumbed in the spring of the pandemic and was green no longer. Yet, its spar stood with branches reaching out like great arms shepherding all the surrounding woods. We watched Osprey devour a fish in those branches and countless carrion foul congress as they dried wet wings.

Finally, last December 23rd, during a gale, Treebeard fell back into what’s left of the forest from whence he emerged many, many years ago. It was not only the end of one tall old tree, reclaimed by natural forces perpetuating the cycle of life and death, but something else was about to take place. Something that the nature of the wood did not intend.


Long I have wondered who owned that land behind our house, but wonder is all I did. Now the fruit of my apathy is manifesting in what can only be described as the nature of man. Or more accurately the nature of some men. For me, it is actually traumatic to witness the destruction. It has given me flashbacks to 9/11.
No one knows better than I do that before construction begins, land must be cleared. But I was not prepared for how the tumult recalled the sounds and feelings of great catastrophe.
Tall trees knocked down by a cast-iron hydraulic dragon thud into loamy soil of now vacant dirt. A dust plume rises into the air and spreads in all directions. It comes to rest on all the flat surfaces of my life and then finally lodges itself in the back of my throat.

I have always known that one cannot simply run away from life’s problems. They will follow where ever the road leads. James Baldwin puts it best:
“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”
He may have been addressing a much greater problem, but as with all wisdom, it applies across the spectrum of human experience.
Now we face a cleared lot that was once a vibrant thicket teeming with natural life, beauty, and wonder. Owls and Osprey, vultures, buzzards, and song birds, deer, fox, rabbit, even bear have all passed through. Countless insects, amphibians, and reptiles have also been evicted.
Now a new animal will take up residence. A very nice man, whom I met the other day, will retire to the house he is building. One lesson learned from September 11th is how I come to terms with life-changing events which are far beyond my control, and how to facilitate renewal with creation. I will not call it acceptance. My heart hurts for the death of so many tall healthy trees just as it does for people who perish in violent acts of war. Acts of terror I will never accept as moral or normal.

As the steward of my little plot of land here there is a job to do…I have a wood to curate, manage, and facilitate into a privacy wall of verdant foliage though I may not live to enjoy that shade. The squirrels have already begun work as many an oak sprout dots my upper yard. Pine cones have also done their jobs as well with seedlings popping up en masse.
The goal now is to manage that part of the berm into a modest thicket. With new plantings of fast growing evergreen and encouragement of the native flora, someday we won’t even notice what we’ve lost. Just as someday far in the future we will forget the ugly scars, the putrid stench, mournful cries, and bewildered eyes of those who emerged from pink dust of 9/11.
But we will not forget their humanity.
That we must…Never Forget.
Thank you for reading.
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