Friday, April 25, 2008

One Thing To Avoid on Earth Day

We had plans...We were only going to use natural light during the day and reduce our water usage. The background music that we usually have on was going to be muted and we were hanging clothes out to dry. We had plans! But then, The water and light company decided to trim trees away from power lines and our tree...the Sycamore tree that my brother and I climbed when young, carving our initials high above ... the tree that all of my children have climbed to be able to say that have seen the markings, was on the list of "too close." They started trimming and I started fretting. They seemed to be trimming too much and on the wrong side. I asked one of the workers how they determine what to trim and he (we'll call him worker A) was very happy to explain that anything within 10 feet of the lines gets trimmed. As he was explaining that, the other worker (worker B) yelled, "Don't tell her nothing, we don't have to tell her nothing! I know how to do my job! Just come on, we will leave and I'll come back and cut the whole tree down!" Stunned silence by me and worker A. I started to cry for fear that he would cut my tree down. Worker B then started yelling at worker A to "come get on the truck", threw the tools on the truck and sped away.

I immediately called the number of the name of the company that was painted on the truck, was directed to call my power company and contacted the head of tree trimming (all the while snotting and crying LOL). I was surprised when the secretary said that a supervisor would be at my home shortly. And he showed up ... 10 minutes later. He was very apologetic and assured us that worker B would not cut down my tree. He said that they should have explained to me what they were going to cut before coming onto the property and that the threat made would not be tolerated. I felt much better... I mean... one thing to avoid on Earth day is the cutting down a healthy, well loved tree.