Cut Down

stump

PHOTO PROMPT © Dale Rogerson

Emory heard that you could tell how old a tree is by the number of rings in its trunk. He had no idea how to figure the age of the stump in front of his place. The city had ordered the beautiful shade tree cut down because it was a hazard.

Pity. He used to sit underneath it with his grandchildren and read to them. He played hide-and-go-seek with them behind it by never quite hiding. It had been his harbinger of winter and his herald of spring.

Now, like him, it was just a broken relic of the past.

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The Year of Alan

lisa snow

PHOTO PROMPT © Lisa Fox

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The first snow. Alan was around ninety. He felt relatively robust, needing only a cane to walk. He cherished this path. He ran down it when he was three in January to build his only snowman.

It was here he had his first kiss in March and was married in April. May was the time for their only child, but by then, Jean knew the truth.

Little Dianna was only six months but he could have been be her great-great grandfather. He was born in January and would die in December. The seasons of his life were but one year.

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