The bright, sunny morning after the February wind storm, I arrived at my office. Lugging armloads of work, I never even noticed that anything was amiss. But as I entered the building I saw an odd darkness in the usual sunniest space.

Looking in at me through the panes of two windows was a tree the beautiful, full, healthy, blue spruce I planted 30 years ago.

“Oh, no!” I exclaimed out loud, even though I was the only one there. I ran outside and looked up. There it leaned, toppled over, all 40 feet in full glory, resting on my office roof.

I ran to its base. Half the root system was out of the ground. “Oh, no!” I exclaimed again.

I checked the status of the office roof and windows. Nothing seemed damaged. The tree itself wasn’t either. I’d always thought of it as a protector, shielding the back of the office building. It had also provided a shelter for years to a pair of mourning doves. I scanned for them no sign. What must they have gone through when this happened?

So there lay my beautiful tree. I wet a sheet and covered the exposed roots. Burlap and a tarp came next.

Googling “uprooted trees” brought me to a University of Florida Cooperative Extension article. There was hope it might be saved!

I immediately called UNH Cooperative Extension’s Info Line to see what they thought. They didn’t discourage me but suggested I contact an arborist.

I called Chris, the arborist who sprays my apple tree. After I explained the situation, making sure he knew how beautiful the tree was, he said quietly, “I love trees. I don’t like being a tree mortician. But she will never survive. She’s too big.”

“Are you sure?” I asked.

“I’ll come and look,” he said, “but I don’t think she can be saved.”

Twenty-four hours later he called. “I stopped by and looked at your tree. I’m afraid she needs to be removed.”

“All right,” I conceded. “When will you do it?”

“Tomorrow,” he replied.

The next day Chris, two other men, and a bucket truck towing a chipper arrived. Branch by branch Chris sawed away, throwing the limbs down to the men.

I watched as he cut each piece and as workers dragged the blue spruce boughs past me and fed them to the noisy chipper, turning the tree into wood bits.

The freshly cut spruce made it smell like Christmas. It was cold like Christmas; even tiny snowflakes blew around. But it surely wasn’t a happy time like Christmas.

I had already decided that though the tree had to come down, it needed to stay. I motioned to Chris to bring the bucket loader down so I could speak to him.

“I want all the chips. I’m going to put them in the mulched area in front of the office. I have a large space, so I can use them there.”

“The needles will take a long time to disintegrate,” he cautioned.

“That’s OK,” I said. It was fine with me that this “mulch” was going to look different. It was different. It was my tree.

Once the deed was done and Chris had left, I examined the stump. It looked like an uneven star. I counted the rings. There were 35. The tree must have been five years old when I planted it.

Out front a massive pile of blue-spruce chips and needles had taken up residence alongside the road waiting to be transported to their final destination. The next weekend my landscape guy came and, wheelbarrow-load by wheelbarrow load, dispersed the remains of my tree across the 40-foot by 15-foot area I can see from my desk.

Now each morning as I start my work day, I look out at the chips. It makes me sad to realize that the towering presence of the tree is gone. Are the chips as beautiful as a 40 foot spruce? Hardly.

But, like the tree, I tell myself, the chips still provide protection to the property. And I can still look at my tree, just from a different angle.

By: Ann G. Haggart, Volunteer Writer