Too Close for Comfort

There is one thing that makes me feel better.  The tree was forked.  It had a double top.  It had a "V" shaped junction about 12 or 14 feet up.  This is a well known weakness in the stem of a tree.  It makes me feel better because I hope that we were not at risk from every tree in the forest.

It was dusk.  We were out in Center Creek looking for a stupid Christmas tree.  It was windy.  Not horrible, but steady 20s and 30s probably.  I was down in the wash near the truck.  VSO was up on the bank.  In the brush.  Picking her way along.  Looking for the perfect four-foot white fir.  A gust came.  A bad one.  Maybe 60.  I don't know.  70.  I was watching her.  I was thinking that it was hard-hat weather.  The people that work for me.  If they are in the woods when it is windy they'd danged well better be wearing their hard hats.  But this was a little family outing.  Getting a tree for Grandma and Grandpa.  I heard a terrific tearing ripping crash.  Out of the corner of my eye I saw two stems.  Falling.  I yelled at VSO.  Harshly.  Get outta the woods.  I may even have used the F-word.  It wouldn't have made any difference.  There was no way she could have outrun it.  Outrun them.  They fell to the side.  Obliquely.  She skittered down the bank.  The wind dropped.  We stood there.  Whew.  She said.  I've never seen wind-throw like that.  Yeah.  Neither have I.  We probably shouldn't be out here.