Friday the 13th, June, 2008 ... It was a dark & stormy night ...

... and I was driving back from a friends house near 10pm. Torrential rains, rattling thunder and brilliant lightening made the going rough ...


I passed by a hastily abandoned fair ground. People were running to shelter under wind-swept umbrellas. Others were otherwise soaked to the skin. All the lights on the fairgrounds were ablaze. The ferris wheel was still turning ...



Once home I peered thru the gloom of the night out over the lake and saw that the lovely old blue spruce on the lake edge had been STRUCK. Horror of horrors. it is a mere 20 feet from the house!!! The next morning I had to arrange for the tree to COME DOWN. Immediately.

A fantastic 'tree guy' came to the rescue at 8am. In a rare feat of confident courage he felled that old tree.

We have had much thunder & lightening for the month of June. Much.

The Blue Spruce Comes Down

Lightening struck the Blue Spruce out front ... this is how it looked first thing the next morning ...

The solution? Gus, the tree guy, from Carlisle, on deck at 8 am ...

He brought the old beaut down within an hour ... amazing, considering how long it has stood sentry on the edge of the lake. We figured it was near 70 to 100 years old ... maybe a bit older ...

Gone. Finito. End of an era.

Gus & The Blue Spruce

... Gus, as seen thru my studio window ... By this point, he'd cut off 4/5ths of the limbs. He wouldn't go up higher on account of the 'lightening tear' in the tree (visible in this photo...). Down he came.

Digital photo collage by mlh

'End of an Era: Gus & The Blue Spruce'

This is a LARGE oil painting - 7 feet square.
Done in my signature 'naive surreal folk abstract' style.
It is 'For Sale', as is, unframed, on loose canvas.
It would be GREAT as wall hanging.
Contact me for further details ...