While I was at the Seattle Airport waiting for my flight to Alaska one Sunday last month, I received a text from my next door neighbor offering condolences that the gigantic live oak in my front yard had fallen during the predicted Bomb Cyclone that hit Sacramento that morning. Actually only half of it fell, the four huge front trunks of the multitrunked tree uprooted and toppled completely blocking the street. Luckily, it was early morning and no one was walking or driving by and no cars were parked under it. Friends took care of the immediate problem and the next day, Acorn Arboricultural Services was on the scene. At first they thought the remaining tree could be saved but the arborist sought a second opinion and they finally agreed that my thirty plus year old summer shade tree had to go. Friday morning, Blake, Andrew, and Chuck from Acorn arrived to cut it down. With climbing equipment and safety ropes, Blake ascended the tree and began to saw off branches. As he made his way through the treetop, he moved his carabiners and safety ropes. This shot made me think of steer ropers at a rodeo. It’s a tough job. They did it safely and cleanly. I’m sad to see the tree gone. When we moved into the house, I called it my oak shrub, this multi-trunked live oak that was barely ten feet tall. Thirty years later and at forty feet, it supplied lots of shade. I will miss it.