Slowly Dying

The chestnut tree out front, chronicled in blog posts from 2018 and the eponymous Chestnut War, continues to die. Now at an accelerated rate. A large branch maybe five feet long from break to leaf tip fell off one sunny September afternoon. No storms that day so I guessed just a sudden snap of wind. or just the sudden chaos we invoke hypothetically. That branch got "hit by a bus."

The tree has a complete and lovely overall superstructure. At the end of the intersection of Addington and West 120th, one can see it from seven house lengths away and it looks like a lovely tree with a tight bobbing outline against the houses. Its a tree you would see features on a logo. Closer up, however, you can see the patchy empty boughs where entire leaves have withered away. These are big hurting bald spots on the tree where the park curls up form the branches and lichen takes over where wood hasn't frayed. Up close it has this melting snow cone look where flakes of snow have melted and refrozen together, albeit briefly, to come up with a jagged canopy.

Summer 2021 and the tree was loaded with the wispy pipe cleaner flowers. All through August there was that perfume fairy piss smell but that boon turned into few nuts. Likely the neighbors have plundered most of them (My wife swears they are the ones who broke the big branch) but just enough to fill a cereal bowl. A big cereal bowl, mind you. A real two scoops of real raisins and flakes kind of bowl, but a cereal bowl nonetheless. Each year they have dwindled in amount and also in value. From  a precious crop to just a novelty. They taste sloppy chalky when roasted, but with enough sugar I can try to make homemade orgeat. That is a nutty syrup usually made with almonds but could be an artisanal blend made with actual chestnuts. Or even peanuts for this circus feeling kind of drink. The handful of nuts should be enough for that. And, if any other ersatz ones do fall, I can add it to the seeping pile in the vial. 

I imagine that the next five to seven summers will see more branches slough off. Maybe ones big enough to block the driveway or other wise actively inconvenience the house. Bit by bit it will clockwork out into a stumpy snag with snarled branches and just one section with leaves. There will be less actual chestnut husks by this point, but I will never be so brave to head out there barefoot. It would just make for an even more elaborate story. The one branch dropping the one last chestnut grenade. Even a glancing blow will send someone hobbling. 

Long Weekends

This post is a bit dark. It's a digital pity party shouted into the void. I don't have any meaningful connections and no one reads these. The metrics on the admin dashboard will say a single person did. The page views with their one cyclops eyes but I bet that is just ingrained into the software to make one feel better.

That all said that if somone does read this then that is the content warning. It's all quite pathetic beyond here.

I hate long weekends. I rather be working,  having some degree of validation made in the office. Sometimes I think of any professional exchange as this big game of tennis. And I'm slamming back each ball asap only to wait for a return. And often that return never happens or is weeks late, this time table only exacerbated by the long weekend. 

I need an answer back from a vendor and they left early for the holiday weekend. Everyone else unplugs and I'm left trying to sneak in work or just diving right into it during a rare moment of the kids being at peace.

I hate long weekends beacuse its more time for my kids to prowl around and look for conflict. My son is a deep well of rage and he will meltdown for hours in his room screaming while the rest of the family tries to pretend this isn't happening. A house full of toys and games and the option always is to fight or rage. At work I could let the teachers handle it for just eight hours and then get a nice email saying how they mostly held it together.

What makes me feel better is checking stuff off the list. Long weekends nudge this. Really should clean the garage. Get your hair cut. Organize that shelf. This on top of the usual weekend get stuff done like the Sunday blues piles of laundry. So I flit between these tasks and just find more and more until I say fuck it and just lay down on the couch. I rather work so there is so grater fulfillment or mission

I develop unhealthy infatuations at work that align any sense of my self to said crushes responses. My current job is my longest running and also one with most coworkers so these are numerous albeit they ebb save for two long running  colleagues. So , I rather work so I have some excuse to message them and then segue to sharing a meme or reminding them how awesome they are and/or how shitty this place is, am I right?! So desperate for dopamine that just getting a like on the all office Slack sends me briefly away from the shady sunken place. I'll find reasons to message them over the weekend to feel soemthing and then hate myself due to interrupting what I assume are fabulous lives.

I'm only as good as how not good others are and this will all be exposed one day so I work to build some insurance.

He really did suck but he did close the support tickers quickly, I guess.

False Fall

Early September and everyone is switching to early spooky season. But, it is still hot, pushing on 82 degrees and still as soupy and buzzy as any other day in August or July before it. 

There are still mountains of tomatoes dropping from plants and becoming burdens to anyone not prepared. And those prepared (People with canners or raw tomato enthusiasts) likely grew their own tomatoes so instead they are left in office break rooms (Free! TAKE ONE!) or handed out like ticking white elephant style gifts. Quick, eat this before it spoils. 

This is when smart people will say "Pumpkin spice doesn't really taste like pumpkin you know?"

Indeed just like the butter at movie theaters is not butter and the fluff inside Oreos is fluff instead of cream. Or crème to keep it extra confectionary. 

Even smarter people will say "Pumpkin spice is a mix of mace, all spice, cloves, cinnamon etc that is used for all kinds of baking. Women started adding to their coffee because it reminded them of these things so when you hate pumpkin spice you actually hate women."

For sure, it began a something small. Is there a coffee shop where they first made pumpkin spice? I used to live in a place where they fought about being the originator of the term "ice cream sundae."  And, home is where the pina colada supposedly began albeit no one wants to claim it. No one who wants to be anyone or anything at least. So this has to exist. Wherever pumpkin town USA exists, some local coffee shop dropped that 25-30 years ago and then the genie could never be let back in the bottle. 

 

This early and its false fall. Its hoodie weather and everyone looks great in hoodies. 

Your rival? They looks extra zippy in that red hoodie

Your friends? They look great and maybe you can match dueling hoodies

Your crush? Act normal, not dumb, but they look banging in that heather grey hoodie. 

You! Yes, even you. This is my hooded sweatshirt from college ten years ago and yes I still fit in it and yes I look bomb in it.

As a young man I bought a solid white hoodie with royal blue trim and wore it all day on a flight from the tropics to the snow mounds of northern New York state. Did not spill a damn drop on it. Which would be first and last time that happens. As an old man I still quickly flip that hood up and when it catches over my scalp in one go I feel infinitely powerful. 

Apple picking weather. Apple picking is a racket. The farmer realized how profitable it would be to have people pay THEM money to pick apples because its fun or for family photos. You get to the orchard and they only have two sizes. 

Inconveniently small. This box is the size of a child's lunch box

Inconveniently large. This bag is the literal Bag of Holding from a Dungeons and Dragons quest. There could be a dragon in here!

The practical bags have already been stuffed full of apples and laid out in the orchard's gift shop. That is no fun. 

So you get the HUGE bag because 1) Fuck it 2) While I don't think I can eat 100 apples I sure as hell can eat more than the 5 the tiny bag can hold and 3) We will make apple pies. And butter and jams, etc, etc.

Then you need to haul the hug bag loaded with apples all over the orchard strategically trying to leave space for the varieties all the way at the end of the rows. Don't get too crazy with Jonagolds. There are Fujis in the WAY BACK and those are my favorite. Bright white blistering sweet apples. 

True fall comes later and after Halloween. In the doldrums between it and Thanksgiving. Here the charms are gone and it is getting to cold for any of the hay bale rides and cider sniffs. There it is blustery and scratchy as leaves pour over the pavement.