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A client's comment about a willow stump made me pause
I was finishing up a removal for a lady in her 80s, grinding the stump of a weeping willow that had split. She was watching from her porch and said, 'You know, that tree was a cutting from my mother's place. I always felt bad about taking it down, but I guess you can't save everything.' I told her we tried a cable system a while back, but the decay was too far gone. She just nodded and said, 'Sometimes the best care is a clean end.' It hit different coming from her, not another arborist. We're so focused on preservation, which is good, but her view was about the whole life of the tree, not just our fight to save it. It's stuck with me all week. How do you guys handle those talks when a removal is the right call, but it still feels heavy?
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iris9272mo ago
Sometimes the best care is a clean end" is such a heavy line. I get that weight. My go-to move is to make some dumb joke about how the tree is going to a big forest in the sky, and then I immediately feel like a total clown because the client is just standing there looking sad. It never lands right, but I can't seem to stop myself from trying to lighten a moment that probably shouldn't be light.
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the_simon2mo ago
Remember a buddy telling me about removing a huge old oak for a family, and the granddad just kept thanking the tree for the shade. @iris927, your joke thing is so real, we all fumble for the right words. That old lady's line about a clean end is the kind of quiet truth that cuts through all the awkward stuff we try to say.
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