Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, June 7, 1990 TAG: 9006060276
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: E-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BEN BEAGLE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
We have had a lot of experience at this kind of thing.
I know, for example, that when we tie a rope to a tree that is to be sacrificed I will be the Puller of the Rope and my son will be the User of the Saw.
As a Puller of the Rope, I know to watch the top of the tree being sacrificed. When it starts forward, I drop the rope, scream and run away through the underbrush.
I'm proud of what I do with a rope. Without me, the tree could fall on my son's mother's azaleas by mistake.
I am pretty good at this. In all my years as a ropeman, I have never been seriously injured. I have been brushed by a few tree tops when I either didn't run fast enough or scream loud enough, but nothing serious.
After we get the tree down - a maple that has been shading the flower garden too much - we walk around saying things like, "When we say we're going to put a tree somewhere we put it there, baby."
After a ceremonial drink of Gatorade, we begin the timeless ritual of Cutting Up the Tree and Pulling the Branches Uphill Until You Drop.
To perform a real tree-purging, you must drag all the branches uphill. Downhill is out. And the branches must be piled where they will kill a lot of grass before you can get rid of them.
On this morning, we have more to do than roping, pulling, cutting, running, screaming and dragging.
After pouring Gatorade in the pattern of a five-pointed leaf on the ground, we begin The Removal of the Small Stump from the Middle of the Side Yard Ceremony.
We begin at about 11 a.m. By 2 p.m. we have dug a hole three feet deep and have snapped three ropes trying to pull this stump out with a four-wheel drive truck.
When the rope snaps, it sounds like gunfire and this draws several neighbors who give advice.
We find the stump actually is a solid mass of wood about the size of a butcher block.
Nobody wants to think about how far it goes into the ground.
We consider dynamite. We saw, chop, kick and pound this stump.
By 4 p.m. we have gouged enough off the top to bury the rest off the stump with dirt - making it appear that this sucker never existed.
We are humiliated and our backs ache. The chainsaws are ruined.
I haven't said a word because everybody in my family thinks I'm weird enough already.
But, I think we offended The Great Mother of Stumps because we didn't pour the Gatorade the way she wanted.
by CNB