No More Lamp Post Any More

[poliphilo]

So next time I take a photograph of the hills from our bedroom window there'll be one less foreground object to avoid getting in shot. The lamp post outside our house has been disconnected for years. Yesterday they finally came to dismantle it and take it away. It took them about ten minutes. I heard a road drill and a buzz saw and by the time I hoiked myself out of my chair to go see what was happening the pole was already felled and loaded on the back of a lorry.

Ailz used to say that as an urban witch she'd rather hug a lamp post than a tree. I know what point she was making - but I didn't think she ever really meant it. And now I know she didn't because when I told her our special lamp post was gone all I got was a grunt.

Comments

[meekins-says.livejournal.com]

I am sorry for your loss.

No, really...i'm not being sarcastic. Little things like that in life can be quite big...even if it's just part of your view outside.

I always feel sad when I see a fresh tree stump in someone's front yard. They are always massive stumps and you know the tree was enormous.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I've lived here over twenty years and the lamp post was always there. It's witnessed a lot.

Any change in our immediate environment reminds us of the passage of time and the approach of death.

[msjann65.livejournal.com]

With Ma now in full time nursing care I too see the previews of coming attractions - for our family is extremely long-lived.
A few days ago a truck came to park in the no parking spot in front of my building. In the process of parking the vehicle it backed into and broke off completely at the trunk a little tree at the curb. When Imoved in here three and a half years ago the little tree was dying to all appearances. One of the elderly men in the building adopted that tree, watered it, kept the neighbors from allowing their dogs to use it for a pee post, encouraging them to use lampposts instead, stirred up the soil around it, and just generally let it know he loved it. Last summer that little tree had a full crown of beautiful geen leaves. And then a careless (and lawbreaking) driver killed it. Needless to say, my neighbor Mr. S. is seesawing between heartbreak and anger, just as if he had lost a family member.
Yes, although this is not a massive stump like meekins referred to it was part of our landscape and so will be missed.
Yes, Tony, it is a reminder of how frail life can be.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

That's a terrible shame.

You can get attached to trees.

There are people who believe that certain trees- especially ones that have been loved by human beings- are "ensouled". I'm not sure how far I go with that but I'd very much like it to be true.

[msjann65.livejournal.com]

I could get behind that idea without much trouble. I had a "Daddy Tree" I used to sit in when I was a young woman of 18, living away from family for the first time.

[manfalling.livejournal.com]

Approach of death! Cue the Chopin piano sonata number 2 in B major...

I remember the time a lamp post got knocked down by a truck. That was cool.

Full time- if you had to put an hourage count on the work you do- would it come to full time status? If so- they're paying you WAY below minimum wage.

Mike.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Is that the one that goes Da-da-da-da-da, da- da-da-da-da-daaa?

Yeah, the carer's allowance is pitiful. It's really just a supplement to the disability allowance that Ailz draws.

P.S. How's about if we tried to sell this bike of yours? Maybe on eBay. I can't guarantee we'd get very much for it.