Chestnut War Part 2

"This here is a Chinese Chestnut or a Buckeye tree," said the neighbor. I am not an inherently neighborly person so I did not seek his advice. He caught me getting out of the car one day after work. I call him Bud albeit I do not recall his name. If this sounds mean then I can guarantee he has no clue of mine.

He was right. It is a Chinese Chestnut. It is not a Buckeye which is a separate tree with a totally different shaped leaf albeit it also has a gnarly fruit.

"And the nuts here are prized by the Orientals that live around here."

In person I told him "Oh ok. Wow" and then other quick pleasantries to end the conversation.

Internally, I began to bullet list questions

1) This is not the first i have heard of the "Asian Invasion" each fall. Is it really such a neighborhood event?

2) Where are they? The neighbors?

3) Who still says Orientals? It comes off as anachronistic and icky. Does Bud call all women "Broads"?

Bud was not the first neighbor to tell us. Or the last, but he was the only one who made a point to come from his home and warn us.

But at that time I paid it no heed. It wast the 3rd of September and my son was about a month into kindergarten. Which he attended at the same school where I work. There was also a new set of principals at our school and it was a slow burn of a professional marriage. My mother in law reached the final stages of her dying at this point and it stressed my wife. My son was about to hit his first fall break (Something that seems normal to everyone else but I never heard of until I began working at the school) and where he was going to go and how we would pay for it stressed me.

However, on a Saturday that all changed.

To maximize this story it is important for you, rare reader, to understand the scene. Because this saga is like a play on a neat rotating stage. On one half is the living room. A sad oatmeal brown couch always covered in a grey/white cat and varying blankets. A deep brown end table stacked with yet to be read books, some still with the price tags. The throw pillows are a pea green and stuffed with real feathers.

On the other side of this lazy Susan is the front yard. The Chinese Chesnut sprouting from a ring of brick pavers. Around the trunk are hostas and the dying stalks of pansies and geraniums. It being close to October there are hanging Halloween decorations on the branches. Cheap but durable dollar store hanging ghosts and specters. All skulls and spooks swinging in the breeze. The ground is more chestnut husk than grass.

And the last bit of setup relates to me. I had blown my back out a few days earlier putting on a pair of jeans. This would end up being a debilitating injury (Which I hate calling but it is such) that sapped me for three weeks going past the aforementioned fall break and coloring the whole chestnut war. Also, note I sleep on the couch every night. Like a childhood hero, Fox Mulder. Not because my wife says I snore.

To rise each morning I would need to roll onto the floor off the couch. Literally drop because I could only turn to the left side. It was a shot drop so I would usually catch myself with me knees. Then I would pivot slowly so I could straddle the couch like it was the top of the pews at church. It looked like I was praying "Lord, give me strength to get up"

Then in about 6 minutes I would pick myself up. First onto the couch cushions, then onto the arm and then a long stretch to the small shelf made by a pony wall cut between our living room and kitchen. I could, with luck, in about 10 minutes physically get up from bed. Luckily there are no pictures but I would describe it as hilarious for viewers and stomach dropping anxious for me. Even a small wrong turn would send electric daggers up and down my back. So I would fall back done and try to clamber up. How stupid this all sounds can only be matched by how much it hurt. One morning I slipped and the pain, plus the biological routine of each morning, meant I actually pissed my pants trying to get up. I did not go to work that day.

But this is not a story of my fall but of a chestnut war.