My Fear of Trees

A couple of days ago I was attacked by a tree. This single attack brought back a latent childhood fear.


It was perhaps the most petrifying aspect of my childhood, which was wrought with such terror over things like hair that wouldn't feather just right, throwing up at school, and the telephone. The phone's a later post … maybe. I still have issues to work out with phones.


Anyhoo, I was afraid of a tree.

Not trees. Tree. As in one. Solitary. By itself. Stag. Alone at the party.


Shudder. My heart palpitates just thinking about a tree standing alone.


Forests didn't bother me. Neither did a bunch of potted trees for sale at the garden supply center. Or a nice bunch of trees planted together in a pleasant grouping in someone's yard.


But one tree by itself … shudder. Scary stuff, my friends. Scary stuff.


I blame the movie Poltergeist. "Ahh, yes," you are saying to yourself right now. "Poltergeist."

Wait? What? Poltergeist? The "they're heeeeerrrrreeeee" movie? With Craig T. Nelson and the swimming pool? The light in the closet that sucks people into oblivion?

*Sorry to spoil the movie for those of you who haven't seen it yet.


Yes. Poltergeist. Remember the tree in the front yard? The one that ate the boy, Robbie? I repeat: The. One. That. Ate. The. Boy. Robbie. Ate. The. Boy.


Know what I took away from seeing the movie? A tree in your yard could eat you. I had a tree in my yard. A couple actually. Not all of them were planted in some type of grouping either. Some were loners. 


Gulp.


Like the one in my front yard.


Gulp. Shudder. Twitch.


I used to lie awake in bed at night and think about that tree. Some nights it bothered me, but other nights … not so much. After much thought, I decided that I wasn't afraid of the tree in my front yard because it was a young locust and everyone knows that the trunk of a young locust tree is too small to ingest someone.

But the large oak tree in my backyard … the one that stands all by itself … that one could definitely be a meat eater. And it had a bigger trunk than the young locust.


Yep. That tree is carnivorous.


For years I was afraid of that tree. So much afraid, in fact, that I would give that tree a wide berth whenever I had to walk by it. I didn't even walk under it's branches. Branches, as I'm sure you know, are the chopsticks of a tree. Forget what you learned in Science class. The sole reason a tree has branches is to help the tree eat a kid.


Getting my hair stuck in a tree at the video rental store brought back this formerly suppressed fear of a lone tree. I'm glad it did because after a brief freak out/spazz attack, my heart stopped palpitating, my breathing returned to normal, and I stopped sweating profusely. I untangled my hair from the branches of the ornamental cherry tree. Which stood alone in the parking lot of the video rental store. 


I conquered my fear. 


Of course, I did peel out of my parking space faster than necessary. I'm not one to tempt fate. 



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