Our move and downsizing helped us learn what things we could live without. However, after almost forty years in our previous home, we were surprised to realize what objects my husband and I would miss most.
We could live without the big backyard with all its gardening space and fruit trees as well as any particular room in the house. Certainly we could forgo the busy street in which our home had been located. When backing out into traffic, it provided a challenge except on early Sunday mornings.
The most treasured part of our former home inhabited the front yard–the maple tree. 
In the four decades we’d lived there, it had grown from an insignificant sapling we had to warn our four-year old daughter not to step on, or try to climb. By the time we’d moved, our maple had developed into a majestic size and shape. It’s covering offered an umbrella of shade in the summer as we sat on a bench beneath, catching cooling breezes from the passing traffic. In the fall, its hidden beauty shone through the colorful leaves which filled many a giant garbage bag or offered mulch for our flower beds. If lucky, a strong wind carried the leaves to five different counties
Our son and his friend used it to perch from while taking on the persona of ninjas planning an attack on some unsuspecting passer-by. In more recent years, my grandson and friends climbed upon it and hung out in their club. My husband used it, toward the end of our stay, as a resting place between his small spurts of yardwork, following his heart attack.
The tree had weathered many storms over the years. In spite of much taller pine and blue spruces becoming uprooted, the maple’s long roots that took over our side yard had kept it upright. It’s main risk factor turned out to be the city’s task force who made it their business to produce a bald spot in the lovely foliage to make a clearance for their wires.
We had found ourselves ready to move into our condo. Our downsizing had been mostly completed and we had dealt with emotions about leaving our homestead. But how about our maple tree? It wasn’t like we could dig it up and somehow plant it on our condo balcony. We had a last picture taken in our precious sheltering hideaway. My husband and I would have to keep the memory alive in our hearts of our most cherished possession there and hope the new residents could have similar experiences under its branches.
Dianna
Sharing the Fruit of Maturity
