This is a tree.

So, this is a tree.

It used to stand straight up on the west side of our house, in the neighbor's yard. Our street is great for trees. In a really good summer and fall, they give the illusion of fully covering the street. When Jake was younger and we walked home from the park one day, he said, "I love where our house lives." The trees were really pretty that day.  

This is a tree. In my yard.

It kind of looked like an enchanted forest actually. Or maybe something from Lord of the Rings, especially when it fell toward us as Jake and I sat in my chair making a tyrannosaurus rex picture together. I hadn't noticed the wind blowing that hard, but Michael and the neighbor say the ground was just too wet. It didn't fall like you’d think either - with a crash and a boom so loud the entire neighborhood comes flying. Nope. I'm pretty sure if a tree falls in the forest, it doesn't really matter much.

This tree, in my yard, is the perfect epitome of wanting things to change, but not that way.

When the tree fell, we had about ten minutes of hyper. We kind of all gasped and oh-my-goshed and ran from window to window, trying to get the view that seemed the most amazing and then we opened the front door and climbed through the branches to take pictures, and we put them on facebook and we got all our friends and family to gasp and oh-my-gosh, too.

And then twenty minutes after that the neighbors and my oldest sons and I went into the yard, and they chopped and chainsawed and pulled on things with rope, and we gathered and rolled and piled up by the road. A few short hours later, our yard was even neater than before. The craziness was totally un-crazed. None of us were worse for the wear, and the only difference, for us, is that this corner of the house probably won't stay as cool as easily as it used to.

I've probably mentioned, I sort of crave change these days. I want to change the furniture, the carpet, my toothpaste. I get excited when the mail comes - it's the only thing I hate about Sundays and holidays. And I wish for change. I hope things will happen to make us feel that life is moving forward. And then I pause. Goodness knows I've been on the rotten side of that wish-come-true. Wanting life to move and shake and change is opening yourself up to the tornado, the illness, the tree falling. And nobody wants those things. Ever.

But it's the enchanted forest moment that gets me. It's the fact that change is sometimes so, so good. Even when it's bad, it brings out the helpers. And then you see everything differently, and that's almost always better. So bitter. So sweet. Sometimes I don't know if I can do one more day with all its potential for bad news and broken hearts and trouble. But it seems like the more you shake things up, the more you learn and the more you see and the less you want to let go.