The Apple

[Bobby Bass]

There is this apple that I can see from my window here at the cabin. I have been watching it since spring. Well I have been watching the same spot since Spring. The apple started off as a bud and then became an apple. I know it is the same apple because when I lean back in my chair here the apple is right behind the handle on the window. Just a little green round hard apple it started off as. Most of the time it was hid by leaves around it. As the summer went on the apple grew and after a time it got heavy and made the branch that it was on hang a little lower. The leaves reached skyward but the apple hung lower. We had a wind storm and a lot of the apples around it fell to the ground,  but my apple, that apple,  hung in there. Squirrels raided the tree late in the summer. Apples fell to the ground but still my apple hung in there.

Fall came and blue jays ran the squirrels off the tree. Using their long beaks they slashed at the apples, not eating anything just acting like a gang of bullies throwing their weight around. Guess what? My apple is still there. Grand kids came and picked apples, they missed my apple. Halloween came and trick or treaters raided the tree but they missed my apple. Every morning I sit in my chair and I check my e-mail, sometimes I have to wait to log in. I lean back in my chair and my eyes look out the window for my apple, still there, hanging from the tree.

Winter is here now, cold temps and more winds have stripped the tree of most of it's leaves. The apple, a bright ripe red hangs by itself. Almost like a Christmas decoration or a bright bobber. I suppose with the leaves all gone I could go out and pick it, be easy enough to see it standing under the tree. But I think I would rather keep leaning back in my chair every morning and check on it. It has already gotten me through Spring and Summer and deep into Fall. Maybe just maybe it  will take me through Winter to another Spring and another fishing season.

I had this sitting in my writings folder, waiting for a good time to share it. Tonight as I sat in my darken den looking out the window with a cup of hot cocoa in hand I watched as a doe slowly worked her way around the bottom of the apple trees. Walking slowly she noses through the grass looking for apples. The ground has been picked bare but she came up to my tree and standing on her rear legs she reached up and plucked my apple!  I got out of my chair and stood at the window, she must have seen my movement and looked back at me.  I toasted her with my cup and gave her a short wave. She dropped down and looking at me chewed the apple and dipped her head, she looked like she needed it more then me.  Tomorrow I'll start looking at that spot, just below the handle. In a few months perhaps, there will be a bud there.  The start to another Spring and another Summer from Lake Iwanttobethere

[Faceman]

Bobby, now that was a great story.