Behind the Pickle Jar by Wendy McQuaig

Author:Wendy McQuaig [McQuaig, Wendy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-11-23T00:00:00+00:00

The vegetation on this farm is beautiful and abundant despite our lack of gardening abilities. The previous family must have truly understood the land. The crop of perennials remind us that there were people on this farm before us. How much change those towering maples at the end of the driveway must have seen in their lifetime.

With their expansive width and height, their branches stretch over the yard providing welcome shade on a hot summer day. They are lots of fun to climb or hang a swing from, and the host of birds and squirrels they are home to, is lengthy in number and variety. I have come to enjoy reading in the hammock under these majestic maples. In early spring, their sap runs, in summer they provide shade and when fall arrives, their radiant leaves will be spectacular.

You can imagine my horror this morning when a township truck pulled up with a team of men, clad in orange vests and began marking ‘X’s’ on random maples up and down the road. God forbid, those beautiful maple trees sporting big florescent ‘X’s’ in the middle of their stately trunks!

Ditching my morning coffee, I raced out the door clad only in my slippers and housecoat. “What is going on here?”, I demanded of the men.

“These trees are on town land mam, and they are going to have to come out for the road widening and paving next spring,” he said as he took in my housecoat.

“What are you talking about? What widening and paving? These trees are on private property,” feeling suddenly protective of our rental farm.

“Well, no mam, those three at the end of the driveway are actually on township land. They are going to have to come out as this road will be widened six metres on each side for the new housing development,” he responded indifferently while turning back to his task.

I felt sick to my stomach. These trees were planted in memory of Daniel and Nell. Although I will have returned to the city long before the road improvements occur, I found myself mourning the eventual loss. I considered how the corduroy roads kept fools from racing down the concession at breakneck speed. One can drive down paved roads anywhere, but only in the country can you find a genuine and charming dirt road. The traffic is light to begin with, so the thought of increasing its width, seemed ludicrous. I guess the housing development will change all that. This paving became even more offensive as it involved not only lopping down beautiful, shade giving branches but entire maple trees that had stood on this site long before these workmen were born, probably before their parents were born. Surely, we wouldn’t chop down our history just for a smoother ride.

The maples that stand at the end of our driveway, reminders of the cherished lives of Daniel and Nell, now sport a big orange X. In a world that is striving to be more ‘environmentally friendly’, surely we

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