Jenny A Koehler
Jerry was a nieghbor of ours. I happened to write a little story back in 2013 about a conversation we had.....\nRecently, my neighbor asked me if I was o.k. with getting some pine trees cut down that towered above our houses, filling our gutters with pine cones & needles year-round, a few of them interfering with the power lines. I could not have made the decision on my own. It was difficult to agree to this as we weighed out the pros & cons. But I knew he was right for the sake of our homes. And so the process began. After the trees were gone, I have to admit I breathed a sigh of relief as I cleaned out the clogged gutters, hopefully for the last time. \nToday, it\u2019s been a beautiful sunshiny day & I\u2019ve been home doing some major cleaning. On one of my trips out to the shed to put away snow shovels (finally), the schnauzer next door let out a little yipe. There was my neighbor sprucing up the most beautiful lawn display of plants, flowers, trellis, windmills, decorations & bird feeders mounted on-you guessed it--the stumps of a couple of the trees. I had seen this plenty of times before, but its beauty had obviously been shaded by the pines. As my neighbor beamed from ear to ear, I congratulated him on the incredible job he had completed, & how he kept the stumps as part of the display. We talked trees some more\u2026.\nAmong his incredible lawn display, in some buckets were maple seedlings. He had found them in other parts of his yard where a large tree would not be a good idea, so he made sure the ground was nice & wet & he gently pulled them up, roots & all. He told me he\u2019s not sure where he may transplant them yet, nor will he see them get very big, as he\u2019s getting on in years. I motioned over to the gigantic maple tree in my yard & told him that my boys helped plant it from a seedling under our deck. And we talked about the chestnut tree behind my shed, which my boys also helped plant. He thinks it might branch out even more now that the pines are not crowding it. He shared with me about his ventures as a young boy planting chestnut trees with his father. He carried the bucket & dropped the chestnuts into the dirt as his father dug the holes. He remembered how slow they grew, but his father would keep reminding him that they would be good strong trees. The roots were growing deep into the earth.\n\nThanks Jerry for the memories! Rest in peace