Cain and Elliott bought a house together on a little no-exit road. The road was lined with flowering cherries, and was called Flowering Cherry Lane. Cain and Elliott called their new home Blossom Cottage. In Spring the road was a picture.
There were only three houses on the road. It was practically deserted. About two cars a day, from the homes, used the road. The cherry trees growing along the verge of the road, apart from providing beauty, gave Blossom Cottage a great deal of privacy.
But – oh! my goodness! – how dangerous! Someone had written to the newspaper and complained. They had gone for a walk and happened upon Flowering Cherry Lane. There was no foot-path! No pavement! No sidewalk! How dangerous is that? They had to walk along the side of the road.
The serious issue was solved. The Town Council had the cherry trees chopped down. A digger uprooted the unsightly stumps. A footpath was created.
Thank goodness common sense and safety prevailed over… over…
…prevailed over… over…
…life.
Flowering Cherry Lane! Such a pretty name for such a dull, no-exit street.
To listen to the story being read click HERE!
yes, there is always someone who wants common sense to revail
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It’s the tale of my little street! But they haven’t cut them down yet – scheduled for sometime this coming year!
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I was going to add “showing in a street near you”
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LOL! Far too close!
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Argh! Let’s hear it for the over-regulators.
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It’s the tale of my little street! But they haven’t cut them down yet – scheduled for sometime this coming year!
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No. I’m so sorry to hear that. Can we come and chain ourselves to the trees? Cynthia would be in on that, I’ll bet.
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The march (to cut them down) is being led by the neighbours, whose section has not a blade of grass out of place. They say the trees drop leaves on the road and it is unsightly!
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Un-freakin’-believable.
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An interesting proposition, Yvonne. I haven’t taken part in a protest since the 1960’s, but persons like us—of a certain age—might be doubly intimidating and guilt inducing to the PC crowd!
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You’ll have to share the chain with the goat, I’m sorry. It’s the only one I have.
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Further to that: the issue is inspired by Cynthia’s poem:
Development
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Hmm, I was in a march for equal pay for nurses, in the 1970s. We could be a force for good, against evil.
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I suppose you nursed a grievance…
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You bet I did. You don’t want to make an enema of me …
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I think the PC crowd would likely vote to have us all annexed too – we are all too old and droopy and opinionated to be seen as correct in any way.
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I think you have a point there, Pauline!
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I too have shed the occasional leaf…
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It is so often a most unfortunate thing being surrounded by stupidity and bureaucracy! Well told Sir!!
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It’s the tale of my little street! But they haven’t cut them down yet – scheduled for sometime this coming year!
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Oh no! Are you going to climb one of them and refuse to come down til they back off?
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They’re unclimbable! Despite the cherries in the story – they’re grotty old verbaliums!
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They may not be the prettiest of trees – but I do feel that any tree is a good tree unless it is putting its roots into drains or dropping limbs on unwary passers-by…..
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I always like Ogden Nash:
I think that I shall never see
A billboard lovely as a tree;
Perhaps unless the billboards fall
I’ll never see a tree at all.
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Pauline…you have just reminded me of a horror show we experienced many years ago, with tree roots invading the main wastewater drain from our house….a large expense to have it dug up and replaced, not to mention the fact that the whole front looked like gravediggers had been preparing for multiple burials there…..
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I too have experienced that horror Cynthia – it’s the only time I would bite the bullet now and cull a tree. The expense and the mess is horrific!
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The thing I liked about blocked drains – if it was the sewer – it was traditional to smoke if the sewer was opened and was the only time as kids we would rush to help!
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But of course common sense didn’t prevail at all! It’s easy, these days, for the PC crowd to win out in the name of “safety,” isn’t it?
Here in Maine we are a bit backward; no one is prissy enough to have a lawn with no blade of grass out of place. There’s little auto traffic on my street and it’s lovely to see people strolling down the middle of the street…couples, children, dogs, and even a ninety-year-old woman out for her daily constitutional. I have an apple tree at the edge of my property and the town truck came by once to trim a bit so it wouldn’t interfere with utility wires, but so far, no threat of sidewalk installation.
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Sadly, it seems to take only the one neighbour! 😦 And he works for the local Town Council. I believe the driver of the town truck simply came to gather apples!
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I like Maine!! 🙂
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Politics as usual. Aha! It wouldn’t be the first time somebody poached my apples!
I have noticed, too, that some people seem to have a strange vendetta against trees. Our first house in Boston had lovely trees, but when I drove by it, shortly after moving away, I noticed all the trees were cut down. There was one, in particular, on the northeast side that protected the building from the fierce winds of winter…..heh, heh, I chuckled, wait ’til they see how cold their living room is, and how high their heating bill…
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A huge macrocarpa tree on the neighouring property of my sister’s place (she lives way in the country) blew down last week. Suddenly sunshine at breakfast in the kitchen! They had forgotten about it! But – it comes with wind!
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The council cut down some trees that grew along a sloping walkway into the park as there were some ‘health and safety concerns’ about trees and passing people…… Now the walkway is always wet from water that oozes from the underground stream the trees drank up. In winter the sloping path is covered with ice and I went upside down three times trying to skirt my way round it. Most recently the council had some workers there for three days ‘diverting’ the water from the path way. The pathway was wet this morning 🙂
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I hope it’s not your famous Baldwin Street!
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No, it’s the dodgy end of town 🙂
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One wonders just whose health and safety concerns hold sway. For no reason I can explain—except personal experience—there just are some people who seem to have a grudge against trees…..”they block the sun”, “the bugs can jump onto your roof from the trees” “they might succumb to a great wind and fall on the house” “they drop leaves all over the place, and you have to rake and rake…” Never mind that the trees also protect, cool in summer and shield in winter, allow children to climb and homes to be private, remove carbon dioxide from the air and give us oxygen, fruit, medicine, maple syrup, nuts 🙂 and inspire us with their reticence, longevity, symbolism and beauty…..
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I think I just read a poem lovely as a tree!
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Apparently all the items mentioned in your last sentence are no longer relevant or necessary. Somewhere in the bowels of the Monsanto Scientific Research Institute dwells a team of dedicated scientists busily crossing toads with pink flamingos to produce the perfect peach, one that will never over ripen or go off. No need for peach trees when that’s on the market!! I heard a woman a while back who began by saying she was a keen gardener and then complained of the birds that sang at dawn and woke her up, the untidy habit of her deciduous trees and the bees that ‘went after’ her every time she ventured out were the reason she no longer grew flowers. 🙂 There’s not a lot one can say in the face of such profoundly arrogant stupidity – so I just gave her one of my famous looks and walked away. 🙂
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Oh why can’t we all get one of your famous looks?!
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Be careful what you wish for…… 🙂
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Thanks for the warning…
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Because you wouldn’t like it at all I am told.
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Maybe it’s one of those things one has to experience…!
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🙂
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Subsequent owners of one of my homes also cut down the strategically-planted shade trees which had already cut my indoor temperature significantly on high-heat days though not yet mature. I strongly suspect most people today under a certain age–let me pull an age out of my rear and say 35–are ignorant of the tremendous differences in heating and cooling bills that shade trees can make, or they have no concept of budgeting, and so do not care.
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It’s the stopping of the wind that I most like…
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Dropping leaves on the road is shocking. The trees should be taken before the courts and bound over to keep the peace. We don’t need antisocial trees, thank you.
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Agreed – treeson is surely punishable.
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That’s all it takes these days – one complaint. The tyranny of the minority. The tail wagging the dog. Do NOT get me started!
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I think I just have (got you started!!) “The tyranny of the minority” is a great phrase.
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I linked over to Cynthia’s limerick (thank you for that link, Bruce–worth the side trip : ), and ranted over there, so I’ll just say here that I’m so very sorry that some of the profoundly ignorant or ill members of our species will be adversely affecting your life at that address for the rest of your life at that address when your spirit is no longer lifted daily by the sight of those trees and the birdsong that they brought.
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There – at present times – are never less than 10 thrushes and blackbirds on the lawn at any one time – …
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How untidy! Poisoned breadcrumbs will solve that problem in a hurry.
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I know from browsing your blog that you grew up Catholic, Outlier Babe, so surely you have heard of Tom Lehrer….here’s his classic “Poisoning the pigeons in the park”….and it’s quite appropriate to the tenor of so many of Bruce’s tales too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhuMLpdnOjY
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SO meant to cite that when I made that crack on Bruce’s post! That song makes me laugh every time, and even more so ever since an old chum sang it onstage while someone offstage tossed the occasional “dead” bird on.
My favorite Lehrer is “Vatican Rag”.
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Perhaps we could get Lehrer to send Yvonne in Venice the pigeon-poison recipe. 10 minutes in St Mark’s Square and you have to look for a dry cleaners.
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Cynthia and I (I believe) have in the past shared a thrush pie recipe…
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😮
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I thought you were describing our street
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LOL!
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They chopped down some flowering cherry trees in a quiet street in Exeter because the roots were interfering with plans for installing cable tv.
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That cherry tree story takes the cake!
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Tell me if I have said that before: the pendulum of evolution is now heading for the other extreme. A fine, metaphorical tale.
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