Trees, part II

Some trees we didn't climb (or at least not more than once). The wild cherry 
trees had a shiny bark that split and formed papery curls (sometimes oozing 
sap at the splits). But the wild cherry trees were home to vast colonies of 
tent caterpillars, so they were off limits. The dwarf apple trees in the back 
yard (a row of five, one for each person in the family) were too small to 
climb, although my brother climbed one once. He broke a branch and got yelled 
at. The two peach trees in the side yard fencerow were just too gummy to 
climb. Their ragged bark oozed sap at every crack and just felt nasty if you 
tried to climb by hand and foot method. We all knew not to try shinnying lest 
we ruin our clothes. So we made playhouses under the peach trees with rocks 
and pieces of brick used to outline our "rooms". We gathered vast slabs of 
moss from the banks of the creek in the woods and used them to "carpet" our 
playhouse.

The sassafrass trees were also not climbed (clumb?). Mainly they were too 
skinny, but also they were home to colonies of "grandaddy-long-legs". I 
thought those spiders with their tiny berry bodies and long, long legs, 
looked like the alien space ships in "War of the Worlds". They just creeped 
me out. Not that I was wild about regular spiders, but I just could not 
stand the grandaddy-long-legs. 

We had sugar maples and red maples across the front of the yard. Only one 
was really climbable. The two sugar maples had shaggy bark, but the one 
square in front of the house had its branches broken off except for small 
suckers. So all you could do in it was shinny up and just cling there. The 
other was okay, once you got up to the first branches about seven feet up, 
but it didn't go much higher and it was at the front corner of the yard, by 
the driveway and the street, so it just felt exposed. The red maple at the 
opposite corner had branches too small to support weight, even though they 
started lower on the tree. We liked to sit under that one and make doll 
clothes from the leaves. The sugar maples leaves were'nt any good for that 
purpose--they were too skinny. They tasted bitter too--when I was first 
told they were "sugar maples" I thought the leaves must be sweet, so I ate 
one. They weren't.

We had a black walnut tree between the little house and the garage that 
was easy to climb because it grew at a slant. The first branches were about 
six feet up, and that's about as far as you could go, but you could reach 
lots of green walnuts from there. They were good to throw. If you waited 
till they ripened and fell, the green covering turned soft and black and 
would stain your hands. The nuts themselves were mostly shell, with only 
tiny nutmeats that had to be pried out with a pick.

Next back along the fencerow on that side was another great climbing tree 
that we called the bean tree. I later learned it was some type of ash. The 
leaves were smooth and grew in groups off a main stem (sort of like a palm 
leaf, the walnut leaves grew like that too). The main characteristic was 
the big clusters of symmetrical winged seeds that grew on this tree. The 
were pale green and pointy; we thought they looked like beans from a distance 
so we called it the bean tree. The black locusts had actual beanpod type 
seeds, but the trees were covered in thorns so we didn't climb them. The 
bean tree split into two trunks very close to the ground and located as it 
was at the back corner of the yard, it felt private. The little house blocked 
view of it from the back door or the kitchen window, so we were out of sight 
when we climbed it. 

The "tent tree" on the opposite side of the yard was named that because 
there was an old canvas tent attached to it when we first moved in. The tent 
turned into a haven for wasps--full of nests, so dad removed it, but a short 
piece of the tentpole he left wired to the tree. It helped in shinnying up 
the roughbarked tree. I believe it was a black gum. The bark was rough and 
crumbly and the first branches were over twelve feet up, so it was a long 
uncomfortable shinny. I didn't climb it very often. It wasn't very comfortable 
to sit in either, and the leaves were too sparse to hide me, add that to the 
boring view and there just wasn't much return for all the effort required to 
climb it. It later became the anchor for one end of our backyard clothesline.

In the middle of the backyard, just at the corner of the little house, was 
another set of black gums, three, joined at the base. We got a rope swing 
hung from the high branch of one and loved to run and jump to catch it as 
high as possible and swing. Because it was on a slope, you had to grab high 
or your feet would drag on the high side. 

There were two more white mulberries that rated. One was the bush tree. It 
was at the back left corner of the yard, by the path that led into the woods. 
It had been overgrown by some type of viney shrub with white flowers in the 
summer. If you parted the vines on the back side you could crawl under the 
bush and find a hidden "cave" under this tree. The tree itself was dead, but 
the bush had sprouted from high up and cascaded all around so there was a 
clear space underneath all around the tree. We cleared out some of the dead 
branches from underneath and made the space bigger. We could hide there and 
noone could see us. 

One other white mulberry served as a hiding place because it was unexpected. 
I never named that one publicly, so the other kids didn't know about it. It 
was in the middle of the back fence row. Because of the honeysuckle on the 
fence, the tree looked smaller than it actually was. But if you used the barbed 
wire fence as steps, you could get into the cluster of branches about five 
feet up and be totally hidden by the big fuzzy leaves. No view, and not much 
higher to climb, but a great hiding place. About all it overlooked was the 
grape arbor and the back field.

Although the woods was full of trees, somehow I never bonded with any of 
them, and never named them. The ladder tree was the only tree outside our 
yard that I named. There was a great mimosa in my grandmother's back yard 
that divided at about three feet up and had nicely smooth bark. If you climbed 
the left trunk you could jump onto the roof of the garage. You could even get 
to the next door neighbor's garage, but their roof was corrugated tin and 
slippery, whereas grandma's was asphalt shingles. The real bonus was the old 
farm bell that was mounted at the gable of grandma's garage. Granddad had 
removed the cord, so we could only ring it by throwing a basketball to hit 
the clapper, or by climbing on the roof to rock it by hand. He eventually 
removed the clapper. I still have the bell (with clapper restored). I'll know 
I've reached my last and final home, the place I'll stay and grow old in,  
when I finally permanently install the bell in my yard.

Grandma's next door neighbor had a wonderful magnolia tree with branches 
starting at the ground like the ladder tree. The leaves were thick and 
glossy and made a nice dark and cool space inside, but she really didn't 
like us climbing it. We had to wait till she was gone shopping and sneak 
over, so we didn't get to climb that one often. Grandma's neighbor on the 
other side had a huge willow tree in her back yard. We loved to run round 
and round, slapping the branches of that one. Early on we'd grab the branches 
and swing on them, but Mr. Lyons didn't like that, so he cut the branches 
shorter. We'd sit under that tree with Mrs. Lyons and grandma and shell 
beans. I was way slower than the grownups, but so pround that I could do 
it too. Their back yard was fenced, but it was easy to climb over. And by 
standing on the fence post you could climb onto the roof of their garage 
too. But grandma taught me it wasn't polite to go in someone's yard without 
asking, so we had to stop doing that. 

c. 2009, B. Riley