Roger Pires March 25, 2010
When he's not offering his take on daily life, Roger Pires spends his days as a computer systems analyst. It's not exactly a glamorous calling but hey, it pays the bills. He enjoys hockey, canoeing, snowshoeing, and spending as much time as he possibly can outdoors. He lives in Udora with his wife and two kids, who are his prime inspiration for Ravenshoe Ramblings.
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The passing of "it"
Spring has arrived in our little corner of the universe. At least it has on the calendar. Until this weekend the space between my ears was still inhabited by thoughts of snowshoeing through wintry woods and gliding across the frozen ponds of our beloved hamlet. Until the calendar page flips to April, the thermostat in my brain remains set to winter mode. Staring at my front yard last Saturday morning changed all that.
Buddy, our hundred-pound yellow lab, has the appetite of a tiger shark and the metabolism of a bowling pin. He is a four-legged make-work project that would provide full-time employment for a road crew and their shovels. For several months, evidence of his oafish presence lays hidden under a mantle of crispy, white snow. But what winter hides, spring reveals. And what was now bubbling up from the depths of brown meltwater kick-started my sense of reality into high gear. My lawn looked like a pack of wild dogs held a bachelor party on it the night before. Spring had definitely reared its pointy green snout.
I donned my seasonal attire of plaid jacket, rubber boots, and a garden spade. And while my family hid behind the curtains in embarrassment, they watched their very own Elmer Fudd fill garbage bag after garbage bag with Buddy’s finest. When the coast was clear and no neighbours were around, my lovely wife emerged from her bunker to talk strategy. In an attempt to cheer me up, she began listing all the household chores that needed to be done. The banishment of winter had shot several tasks onto the critical list. My wife claimed many of them for herself, especially those that involved handiwork and a sense of colour schemes. She left me with such vital functions as fixing the eavestrough, cleaning out the garage, and of course, my current round of lawn maintenance.
There was, however, one task that I wanted no part of. As we do every spring, my wife and I shake our heads and ask, “What’re we going to do with “it”? The object of this query is the pine tree that inhabits the patch of sod in the middle of the driveway. It is devoid of greenery except for a few lonely tufts at the top. The spindly limbs loom over the garage like a Halloween decoration. We read "it" its last rites the day we moved into the house. For six springs it refused to give up the ghost like some coniferous enigma.
I developed a certain affinity for this Tom Thompson reject. I marveled at how it clung to life despite the ravages of wind and frost. Woodpeckers gouged its trunk. Weed eaters slashed its base. Little hockey sticks bashed its few surviving cones from its boughs. In that endearing male capacity to bestow iconic status on objects destined for the scrap heap, “it” is right up there with my Ward Cleaver easy chair and that pair of slippers that talk to me when I walk. To my wife, it’s right down there with my mold-encrusted hockey gear and the Styrofoam container of bait worms she found next to last night’s meat loaf. It’s an eyesore and it’s gotta go. So every year, we perform this little two-step: she slates “it” for destruction and I come up with a new ailment for my chainsaw.
Until this spring.
Sooner or later, even the holiest of t-shirts becomes a dish rag. And so it is with my pine tree. Those valiant green needles have turned to brown. And that noble trunk no longer looms but sags. This season, my chainsaw will bow to the will of the inevitable, albeit with a sense of regret. Buddy, the canine landscaper, paid his respects by lifting his hind leg to it one last time. Even my wife gave “it” a grudging nod of respect before painting a big red “X” on its trunk. But “it” wasn’t quite dead yet. In one final act of defiance, the doomed conifer dropped one of its limbs in the weekend gale – inches from where my wife was contemplating its successor. It’s like they know.
We’re now allowing ourselves to think of what life will be like after “it” has gone to the great wood pile in the sky. My son and his fellow raiders are drawing up blue prints to the fort they plan to erect where a tree once stood. My wife is mulling over whether a maple or an oak would be a suitable replacement – with an occasional glance over her shoulder. I’m consumed with what beer to serve at the tree-felling party (après-tree, of course). My daughter wonders if we’ve all gone stark, raving mad. And Buddy? Well, I just wish he could learn to use a toilet.
