Happy Birthday # 65

"Hey Stuart, that's nothing to be doing on your birthday." Yelled a neighbor from her car window as she passed me as I was picking up sticks in another neighbor's yard. (Isn't Facebook great. She was the third well-wisher to drive by and remind me that I was another year older.) I thanked her and told her that I couldn't think of a better thing to do on a beautiful September morning.

The Maple tree in front of my neighbor's house has been dying slowly for years. Each year he removed another dead branch or two and gave me the wood (I burn wood to heat our house. ) The other day my wife heard some saws running and said "Henry's having that tree taken down." I went out to see and he called me over.  We watched as the crew sawed up the branches and trunk and loaded the brush onto a trailer to haul away. He said; "You want the wood don't you?" I said; "You know I do." "Good, because I told them not to worry about taking the wood and they gave me a better price."

The whole center top of the tree had died this year and when the tree hit the ground the dead wood shattered into a pile of twigs and branches. The crew foreman asked me if I wanted that for kindling.

"You're hoping I'll say yes so you won't have to clean that up, aren't you." I laughed.

He smiled and nodded.

I thought about it for a minute (not long enough) and said; "What the hell, I'll clean that up. You get all the stuff with leaves and I'll take care of the rest." He didn't wait for me to change my mind. I'd made him and his crew very happy.

So there I was on my birthday, picking up sticks, bundling them with string, and hauling them across the street to my back yard. I felt very third-world-ish; scrounging sticks for heating or cooking to survive. I thought about how this job would be given to the women and old men of the tribe and I felt a certain brotherhood with most of the rest of the world.

I could have been embarrassed, I guess. Normally, all this would be raked up and left at the curb for the city to pick up. No sane person does this in our society. I thought about this every time a gas-guzzling SUV drove past and the driver looked out at me. But I wasn't embarrassed at all.

After I picked up and bundled the sticks, I raked up the rest of the debris and wheeled it back to my compost pile. I left nothing for the city and that felt good.