Tommy Climbs a Tree

There are times in every child’s life that you remember fondly because they were special moments:  The first time you rode a bike, the day you learned to swim, or the first time you tied your own shoes.  I remember the day I learned to climb a tree.  I was about 4 or 5 years old, and while I don’t remember what I had done to make my Mom so angry that spring morning…I do remember being chased across the back yard and into the orchard…Mom on my heels.  I felt my feet moving at speeds I had only imagined, as I ran through the short grass like a sprinter, then bounded into the crotch of the Yellow Transparent tree near Vogel’s fence and scampered up one limb as high as I could go.  Breathless and apparently out of her reach…I paused as the adrenaline subsided and Mom turned and walked back towards the house…reminding me as she went that I eventually had to come down…and she’d be waiting.  The fear of eventual consequences, however, quickly took a back seat to the thrill of accomplishment.  I had climbed a tree…and I couldn’t wait to tell someone…everyone!

In recent years when I’ve visited that orchard again I’ve stopped to remember that moment; trying to recall that sense of childhood triumph that so often is lost in the cobwebs of memory.  But now looking back on that time I realize that the tree is no bigger now than it was then, and what seemed like a lofty perch was, in actuality, in easy reach of my Mom’s strong arms.  I recognize now that my Mom must have turned back to the house that day - so many years ago - more amused than angry, and certain in the knowledge that from little accomplishments her child would learn and grow.  I know now that she must have been as proud as I was…as she often showed me on so many other occasions in my life.  I’m still proud to have been a climber of apple trees, and to have had a Mom who understood what that moment meant to a little boy.