A Sad Goodbye

To a fallen friend

We had to make a pretty tough decision today. During the process of designing this house we’ve made every effort to retain as many trees on the property as possible. We’ve done a great job of that, but we found out today that we had to eliminate a tree that we really didn’t want to.

During the bidding process we had several subcontractors come by to give us quotes, but, without exception, all the subs for excavation and concrete had one thing to say: “You’re going to have to cut down the tree in front of your existing house.” We maintained that we loved the tree, it was staying and that was final… until today.

Over the past two weeks the two subs we’ve hired for concrete and excavation have come by to perform a final evaluation before they begin their work. They both stated unequivocally that the tree had to go or else we’d be paying more for the job. Simple as that. Plus, after everything was said and done and the house was built and we were living in it happily ever after, amen, and all that stuff, we’d STILL have to take the tree down because the root system will be damaged by the excavation and concrete work; a fact that my tree guy made sure I was aware of when he took down a tree that had been damaged during a storm last year. So, this morning, after the excavator made his final walk-over, I called Absolute Tree Care one more time and had them put the old girl down.

Call me a slave to filthy lucre. Tell me I’ve just comitted crimes against nature and trampled my better judgement underfoot. You’ll get no argument from me. We’re saddened by the hole we now see in front of our soon-to-be missing house. It’s ugly and barren and it truly seems sickening to have let go of a perfectly healthy tree. Even without leaves the tree was an awesome presence in front of our house. We will re-plant though. In some not-too-distant future we will plant a new tree—not some mere sapling, but a tree of substance—to replace the one we had to cut today. And if we’re lucky? We’ll see it grow to fill the void of the one it comes to replace.