(A little) loss

SEE ADDED P.S.  Also added two new photos to June 26.

The tree across the top of this picture extended up three stories. Note hummer at feeder. 

   








   









     In the vast scheme of things, it isn't a big deal. The liquidambar tree which canopied our patio, the one with shady branches and soft-green leaves like spread hands, the one hummingbird families have hatched in and fledged from, had to be pulled out this morning. It had grown so huge its roots were as big as tree trunks lifting two-inch faults in our cement patio and shrugging aside the fence alongside it.
     I was the one who betrayed the little birds and myself. I was the one who called our landlady (my former sister-in-law) and told her it needed to come out. I don't know why. I don't even like cement. You can see part of the fence had been removed. I could have campaigned to rebuild it around the roots. But before I could waver, she checked it out and had men come cut it down this morning.

     We weren't home but the men who chopped it down told me the hummingbirds fluttered about their heads in agitation. I understood how they felt. I felt fluttery and agitated, too, just knowing the men were there.

     Now I feel loss. There are trees out front the birds live in but I can't see them from our windows. There is even another tree they have nested in near what is now a gaping emptiness but its leaves are ugly and it's not a shade tree, doesn't have gracious, extended arms. I miss the presence and beauty of that tree that has lived here longer than I have (24 years) and been a home to happy little generations of birds. In autumn liquidambars are the only trees around here that change color--scarlet and russet and gold. I never thought to take a picture of the entire tree until it was too late.
     If the hummingbirds weren't so little and helpless, they probably would have had me taken out instead. I wouldn't have blamed them.

P.S. (July 13) - The loss of the tree has opened up a view of the entire western sky from our bedroom. Maybe the Lord will make up for the tree in sunsets.