So long, tree.

Well, the tree I tried to save almost three years ago died anyway. It was a fruitless task for my fruitless plum, a thundercloud, that looked magnificent in the spring and gorgeous in the summer. Last year it only sprouted a few leaves, and by autumn I knew it was dead. 

I brought that tree home myself, in the back of my car, barely more than a sapling, from a garden center that has since closed. It took root and grew where previous trees had failed. Alas, I didn't know that they only live for about twenty years, one of the shortest life spans of cultivated trees, and it had been growing a few years when I got it. In the end there was nothing I could do. The maples nearby continue to thrive, but for the plum, its time was up. 

I only have a hatchet and some saws, and this was no job for that. Time to call in the pros. They dispatched the branches first, then pulled the stump out with truck and chain, like popping a cork. 

Sad to see it go -- by far the most successful thing I've ever planted. What's got two brown thumbs and kills plants? This guy [points to self]. Every spring when it began to flower I'd think I planted that! But alas, no more. It is gone. 

Except for the stump. They said they had to come back for it. Well, I guess they will, since I haven't paid them yet.

Now I have to figure out what to do to fill the hole. I've already had a maple and a dogwood die in that spot, each within one year. 

Maybe I can get a redwood sapling. It would annoy the neighbors. It'd take a century, but it would annoy the neighbors!