I grew up in the woods, surrounded by trees. One feature of this life was that my Dad spent his weekends prowling around with a chain saw. Fallen trees on the hillside behind the house made architectural supports for forts and hideaways. Or, as courage and confidence increased, balance beams on which to practice... I never told my Mum about that. Dad caught me out once, and lopped off a few branches so that the 'balance' had more give and bounced.

The house we moved Dad out of, two years ago, was surrounded by sugar pines. One had collapsed onto the front deck, decimating much, but luckily it left the roof alone. I had one of the world's largest collections of pine cones from all over the world, at that time. Dad mentioned that "it might be time to rethink that." The cones were reluctantly returned to the woods when my house and I parted company. I do miss the trees. ;)