Do you hear what I hear?

As I sit in my living room, I am aware of many sounds - most of them are familiar ones. I recognize the feeding birds chirping a 'thank ya', the 'beep-beep-beep' of a backing up salt truck, etc. Now that it is winter and the temperature/snow/ice are in constant states of flux, nature's noise repertoire includes a "thud" that brings back a memory of a winter long ago.

It was about a year after my ten year old son and I had moved into our little house. It was a cold, snowy, windy night and we were wrapping up another day's activities with warm thoughts of rest and sleep . Jer's bedroom was diagonally across the hall from mine, and after the routine of him yelling out,"I love you!" and me answering with,"You are very special to me!", I rested my head on the pillow and thought 'Ahhhh'. Teaching elementary school kids, managing my newly diagnosed rheumatoid arthritis, and being the single 'head of household' were the exhausting realities of my life. [Not complaining...just the facts.]

So, when the giant...THUD... happened, followed by my son's raised voice saying,

"Did you hear that?"

I quickly began thinking of what I would say to sound calm and matter of fact while hoping that I didn't have to get up.



"That was snow falling off of the tree limbs and landing on the roof. The wind is pretty strong. Love you...Good niigghht!" I had decided that whatever it was probably wouldn't be the least , bit phased by me. [Ya know how you think of playing dead, and it turns out allright. Well, I was going to play 'asleep' and hope for the best. In reality, I would most likely wait until Jer was asleep and then check it out. Otherwise you can just picture the two of us ...me and my shadow...tiptoeing from window to window? Pretty much scaring each other!!

Then I heard his loudest, "MOM...COME HERE...A TREE JUST HIT MY BEDROOM!"
Out of my bed and into his room, and we both looked out the window at the big, snowy, locust tree laying on the ground. The locust tree group[one of a family of five] was right outside his bedroom window and he used to complain about them because they 'creaked' and it sounded like moaning. My reply was that you didn't cut down a tree because it creaked!

Well, it wasn't creaking anymore...it was down for the count!
And since a 'creak' became a 'thud'...guess how many of the four locusts are left?

I was told that they had relatively shallow roots, and were not a particularly reliable tree.
So, what did I want? Four more "THUDS" or "ZZZ-z-zz-!"
There are no more freaking...I mean... 'creaking' locust trees right outside that window.
Just...ZZZ-ZZZ-z. Ahhh-hh-h