It all started about 4:00 P.M. on Thursday afternoon. I was thinking about daughters # 1&2 and their families. They were off to see the last shuttle launch. They found a motel on the beach somewhere along the coast and were looking forward to a great view! Daughter #3, her family and I were all invited as well but since the last gang was to leave on vacation the next day from my house, we all decided not to go.
Any way, that is how I found myself on my front porch trimming my topiary and thinking how exciting it would be for everyone to witness this moment in history and looking at the sky and wondering if the weather tomorrow would be co-operating when I heard a funny "bang" sound. It was definitely a wood noise, so I wondered if by chance my neighbor was on his roof and dropped something. I took a peek and didn't see anything when I heard a kind of hissing, snapping sound. And then, within seconds, I saw the huge tree that was at the corner of my driveway come falling down!!!
We live at the top of a circle and that thing fell in the most perfect spot it could have fallen! It missed wires, my hedges, my dogwood tree and even my mailbox! It totally filled up the road and median of grass in the middle of the circle! I called the city and literally within minutes, the police were here just to be sure no one was injured and city trucks began converging.
Now the reason that this was so exciting (beside the fact that I had just witnessed a huge tree falling 15 feet in front of my face) to me is that just a few months ago, my neighbors were clearing most of their trees for a solar heating system for their pool. They wondered if we would like to include that tree while the men were out here but the quote was for $1800 and since the tree really wasn't an issue one way or the other and I have many other large oaks on my "to trim list" this year, I decided to save my money for them. One of the guys trying to convince me to do this kept saying that the tree would probably come down and if it fell in the road, I would be responsible. Somehow that didn't seem exactly right - I figured I WOULD be responsible for what was still on my yard - and I filed it away for future consideration.
Well, the city of Ocala totally rocks as not only did they cut up and remove EVERY speck of tree and tree debris, they hauled off the HUGE trunk that was totally still on my property. And, they gave us all much afternoon entertainment as the tree filled 2 trucks and took 2 cranes to get the job done! My grandsons were beside themselves - Nana was pretty happy too!! One more thorn-in-my-side taken care of. Now if I could just do something about that humongous tree that hangs over the shallow end of my pool and new patio and constantly drops junk everywhere! Unfortunately, that one will be a problem if it falls and probably take out my house, gazebo, fence and pool along with it. It belongs to my neighbor but he has said we could trim what hangs over our side, so that is probably where this year's "trimming" budget will go.
So, although we missed the excitement of the last shuttle launch, we had more than enough excitement of our own to make up for it.....and I have one less tree to worry about. Ahhhhh!
No comments:
Post a Comment