2023 Life Logs, Day 314: A Day All About Trees and Plants
Date: Friday, November 10, 2021
Weather: Partly Sunny; High 52 Low 42 degrees F; Sunset 4:29 pm (-0 min)
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, MA
By 8 am this morning, there was a big wood chipper truck in my driveway whirring away and at lease four chain saws buzzing.
The noise was overwhelming, and it continued all morning. Cape Home Tree Service was seriously at work, cutting and trimming trees in my backyard and the adjoining property and cutting up the logs from the trees they cut yesterday. Watching these guys standing high in treetops using a chain saw is horrifying, but they are belayed with a series of ropes.
So, supposedly, it is not dangerous. It just didn’t look that way to me. The tops of trees and branches were carried to the driveway to be ‘eaten’ by the chipper, and a little later the chipper was replaced by a huge truck that was loaded with the big logs by a another piece of equipment like a back hoe. But instead of a bucket it had huge jaws that picked up the logs and put them in the back of the big truck.
At 11 am I was in the living room on my computer and suddenly I stopped because it was quiet. The guys were taking a break, but the silence was overwhelming. I had invited Ollie over to watch the process, but he and Jed didn’t arrive until the 11 am silent period. Jed dropped Ollie and his little John Deere tractor off and Ollie spent the next three hours watching the process while working for Lynda.
He hauled wood chips from a huge pile to garden areas and spread them in the parking area.
He is a good little worker and it was so cute to see him on his little tractor alongside the guys in the big equipment.
By 2:30 pm, I took Ollie and his tractor home and went with Karen Baranowski to tour the gardens of friend Kate Eldred. This was my second tour in two weeks, but those two visits have given me a great introduction to garden plants. When I got home and headed into my house, my attention was drawn to my glass-topped outdoor table in the front yard. The sun was beginning to set and it looked like there was puddle of water under the table.
Upon closer examination, I realized that the glass top had shattered and fallen to the ground. Lynda appeared to explain that while I was gone, the tree people had brought in stump grinder to remove the stumps of the two holly trees that were taken out. Lynda was standing by the table when suddenly the glass shattered. She believes it had to be the vibration of the machine. The tree people said they would clean up the glass tomorrow, but I am not sure if they will replace the glass. The table and chairs were given to me by the Woodins and I love it. I was very sad to lose it. But other than that one incident, the tree removals went smoothly. It is going to take me a while to get used to the new landscape. I miss those trees.
