I had been procrastinating for two years. The time had come and it was over in minutes when it did happen; the pine tree that had stood as a sentinel at the Stanton front fence was down.

Two pine trees grew up together after they were planted 70 metres from the house in 1919. An old man who once lived at Back River and walked past Stanton on his way to Back River school as a boy remembered seeing them as small trees. He is still alive, now in his early 90′s as when I last saw him he was the human equivalent of the other still standing pine; gnarled, solid, wizened and healthy. As things go around here both of them will follow the first tree into the next life, its inevitable but that’s ok.

The fallen tree as it turned out was senescent and a hazard to man and beast. At 27 metres it was making a big statement about its position here at Stanton and I am mildly smirkful (I like this strange word) when thinking about myself being a menace to the public at age 91. Still. I didn’t want him killing my neighbours in the night; one of whom is Nathan our cabinet maker. Another is new this month, freshly arrived from Kalgoorlie, WA. Do they have trees there?

My thoughts about the two old men of Stanton watching over its entrance are possibly incorrect but they make sense to me. Most of the trees here at Stanton are Macrocarpa but these two boys are Radiata, very different lads indeed. Moreover, the white cockatoos clamour about the Macrocarpa while the black cockatoos prefer to squark in the Radiata. Some things are perhaps black and white after all. I believe it would have been a great gesture if these two odd trees were planted here together during 1919 in remembrance of those men from the New Norfolk area who did not return from a war few people understood but clearly presented to all painful memories shared around a small country town. No one can explain why the trees are, or were together out in the open. I like my idea about it all.

Around this time the inhabitants of Stanton were probably more interested In Richmond winning the Premiership of the VFL comp. They would have been alert to the goings on at the relatively new production facility Henry Jones’ IXL company had set up in New Norfolk.

Apricots from Stanton were grown for tinning at this new Derwent Valley factory, previously they were taken to the IXL site in Hobart then sent as jam to Australian forces overseas during the First World War. The IXL site in Hobart is now a nationally known waterfront hotel and holds a new and pleasant memory for me.

Here at Stanton life was of the rural flavour and will be once again with an exciting new adventure planned for the future.

Back then when the young boy and the sapling trees were looking at each other not thinking about their very long life ahead people here may not have been mindful of other worldly events … that Mahatma Gandhi was about to emerge as a nation’s inspiration to advance, or that Australia had just become the original member of the league of Nations. Such things were Secondary to the seasons and the work calendar dictating effort during these times.

People who come to Stanton oft see history in a new light.

The downed pine is now causing a new vibrancy of colour to be thrown on Stanton and its neighbours in an arc of sunshine that no one in Back River has seen in recent history. Afternoon sun once more streams onto the house, and into the rooms. It is almost hot at times. The airy feel to the new vista is welcome. Not a bad look, not a sad sight. It all went down quickly and very quietly. Indeed there was no noise at all in the vicinity.

Taking down a tree and doing traffic control is a four man job but only one does the felling. He is usually older and wears a more faded orange shirt, more importantly he has a face that tells you he has done this before. It is a face of experience and so with ease it places you. The smiling assassin image of old movies comes to mind; or the friendly butcher who flirts a lot in his shop just as he is about to chop up the family pet Bambi for steak on Sunday.

Cutting down an old tree can’t be good for the soul and it may not get you into Botanical heaven, but there are times when it is necessary.

Two years was long enough. The lone figure at the bottom of the tree was thorough and professional, not boastful. He left us with a massive round table top for the house which should last us until the new tree spreads its limbs, and another small boy walking past growing into a man.

I think it will be an oak.