The box elder is coming down.
After a series of storms that have left its limbs broken, hanging and scraggly, the 50 foot box elder tree that hides between our garage and the neighbor's fence is coming down.
Sure, last year it dropped thousands of seeds all over our yard and clogged the gutters. Ok, the summer before that, it drew thousands of box elder bugs to our yard, and an entire side of the house turned red and black, blanketed with their soft little bodies. And, all right, some of them snuck in the windows. Yeah, and the whole thing is probably a hazard, ready to clunk down on the garage in the next wild windstorm that races through town.
It's just that it's such a pity to cut down a tree, especially on the prairie.
As a friend said the other night: the best times to plant a tree are 40 years ago, and today. It's time to think about planting.
