So this is Oklahoma and we have seasons, and weather, but it seems that we really get winter in odd numbered years (as in the ice storm of 07, the blizzard of 09, and the really big snow storm of 11). Thus far this winter we've had about 6 inches of snow in one snow at my house (parts of the city got less, I think of it as the 'river effect snow'.) And here is a lovely Christmasy picture of my little pine tree in the snow with its decorations of red and green.....
So then a couple of weeks later we get freezing rain, which translates into 'ice', which is not nice like snow. Ice does really bad things to trees, and power lines, and can make us all powerless in a heartbeat. It also really crushed my little pine tree. I posted about it on Facebook, while battling the sick feeling in my stomach that seeing my tree like this did to me. I realized that I grew up in a family that loved its trees almost as we loved out pets, and we really really loved our pets.
Many friends posted that pines are quite flexible and resilient. I quickly realized this was a good lesson for me, flexibility in the face of adversity. But I was really afraid for my tree. Especially after driving around town and seeing massive pines just destroyed by the ice. Several people posted suggestions, like knocking the ice off the tree, except it continued to rain, the lovely freezing rain for about 12 hours, dawn to dark.
And it occurred to me that another truism from my life is that when I try to 'fix' things rather than letting them fix themselves, things often get worse. So I left it alone. I did ponder getting out my hair dryer and melting the ice, but I left it alone.
So that brings us to this, 4 days later (it took that long to get above freezing).
A lesson learned.....flexibility in the face of adversity can save a tree, or a person.......
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