Sycamore

The biggest tree on my street is a giant Sycamore down at the bottom of the hill where Jean dumps onto Carolyn. That hill is steep and Carolyn “T’s” at the bottom of the hill. If you don’t keep the speed under control going down that hill, even in good weather, you could be in trouble. Just to the South of the Sadlon’s house the side of the road just drops off like a cliff. It is heavily overgrown right there at the edge of the road but make no mistake, beyond the weeds and the little Stinko/Ginko trees it drops off like twenty feet. Luckily (or maybe not) if you did miss the turn and slide towards the cliff there is the giant sycamore tree which might just stop you if you are not dead center (apt term) of the turn. A little to the south and you will fly. A bit to the north and you will stop 100% in zero seconds at the breast of this monster tree. Perhaps the airbag will save you. Perhaps not. But there is no way you are going to do anything but stop when you hit that tree.

 

I don’t know how to gauge the age of a sycamore by its circumference. This specimen is a full four feet in diameter at ground level. It stands like a scarecrow with arms outstretched and each of it’s biceps is close to two feet in diameter with arms extended thirty plus feet out. It reaches up into the sky-perhaps not the tallest tree in the area but close. I can’t estimate its height. When I stand under its ‘arms’ the dark shade of the canopy cools the air at least five degrees on a hot, sunny day. I linger there to enjoy the shade. I have fumbled with the thought that it would be nice to have a bench right there. Someplace to bring a book and read in the cool shade of the sycamore tree. Somehow there is always a little breeze underneath. A bench would not work out as everyone coming down the hill would honk or wave or pull over and want to talk. That would completely destroy the miracle of that place. When I stand in the depth of the canopy and look up it seems huge and I feel like I am in a cathedral. I don’t move a muscle if a car comes down the hill and somehow no one ever stops, or honks so “nix” on the bench.

 

Gurler is usually preoccupied with great and wonderful animal smells right near the tree. I know there are fox, and coyote and bear and wood chuck down in the deep woods just beyond the drop-off. I see the bear scat frequently. At night I can hear the packs of coyotes hunting and mating off in that direction. There is plenty of cover and trees to roost in so turkey flocks are commonly seen. I love the screaming Cooper’s hawks and the Red Tails but my favorite things in the woods are the snakes. I am not that good at spotting them but when I do I am happy. Also the giant pre-historic snapping turtles in the pond, but with the algae so thick in the Summer I rarely get a glimpse of them. The other day on our dog walk I noticed something bobbing and playing in the water in the shade of the willows near Mr. Turners shoreline. I snuck up and stood as close to the shore as I dared thinking I had seen otters playing in the muck and green algae. I doubted my eyes and I was right not to trust them from my original vantage point because up close it turned out to be a couple of very large “snappers” rolling and wrestling. Each one of them must have been close to three feet long. Their heads were the size of grapefruit. Crusty with mud and as algae coated as could be they might have been a hundred years old-I don’t know…do snapping turtles get that old? They were each five times the size of the ones who come up the hill and over the rock walls of my property to lay their eggs, and yet they were playing like infant children in the surf at the beach on a summer’s day. I could have watched them for hours but Gurler stood patiently waiting for our walk to continue, eventually culminating in our return to home and her dinner.

 

Anyway, back to the trees. That old sycamore standing like a patient ghost calls to me every day. Under her branches I stand in awe unrivaled by the best services at Temple or Church. Sometimes I like to look at the massive oaks at the intersection of Ruth and Jack Roads but nothing makes me feel like that sycamore. The old oaks have “class”. Spread out majestically over the entire intersection they frame the Craftsman Cottage squarely facing Jack Road like a post card photo or a wall placard that says “Home Sweet Home”. The white oaks are huge. Huge! And I admire them but not like my Sycamore even if it is smaller. It is dark and blends in with the woods in the background. It’s mottled bark looks like army camouflage and it just makes the giant tree disappear. Ask anyone in the neighbor hood about the oaks on the corner of Ruth and Jack and they will know exactly what you are talking about, but not one person I’ve asked has ever noticed the sycamore at the corner of Carolyn and Jean. So, I have adopted it as my own. I stand under it in its shadow every day. Gurler has even noted it as a way-point on our afternoon walk and she goes to it instinctively every day and sniffs the other animal visitors. In the Summer it stretches out as it grows and the thin outer skin of its bark sheds. It comes off in shakes and shims and curls up on the street and in the surrounding woods. It crunches like potato chips as I walk over it and then by spring it dissolves back into the Earth.

 

Like I have said, I considered a bench under it but that will not happen. First of all it is not on my property. The property is for sale but I would not consider owning it for love or money. It is a useless cliff leading to a deep ravine. Good for what it is good for-bears to roam in, deer to cross, wild turkey to roost in the big trees, and other critters to nest, burrow, and hunt. The real estate sign noting its availability has long since fallen over and lays half way down the embankment. No one is coming to put it back up. It will lay there in its plastic-ness fore ever. It doesn’t have the courtesy to dissolve back into the Earth like the skin of the tree. Eventually the Earth will cover it with its own skin, a coating of leaves and dirt and bird shit and sycamore bark, until it is no longer a blight on the hillside. No, no one is coming to own this property. It has no monetary value. The giant sycamore, though, is priceless, more so for the spell it cast on me every time I stand under it. No need to sit on a bench. No need to bring the tree’s existence to light. A bench will not improve the tree at all. I will continue to pray under it daily. A congregation of one. Paying no dues. Expecting Peace but no miracles.