A Tree grows in Brooklyn and Another Grew

and grew in Oak Park, Michigan and it grew. Granny reflects and chuckles. She pats her lap and suddenly 6 toddlers sit eagerly waiting to hear a story.  Wait, not all are on her lap, one is on her shoulders.

When I was young my granny had a big tree in her front yard.  This seed inspired me to greatness.  It twirled through the air like a boomerang, circling around swatting me in the head again and again. Finally, Missy caught it and took it home.
Missy’s Mother lived in la la land, a subdivision of Oak Park, where she grew up. Her mom said she should plant the tree under her window.She was a good girl, obedient and did as she was told, and it grew and grew. Missy had a green thumb and could make anything grow. She fed it with love.
She attempted to tell her Mom but Mom’s  glare summed it up.”Can’t you see; I’m on the phone” she hissed,”To the psychiatrist! Oh well, it grew through the roof. Then they moved the tree and the tree was very happy.
Granny went to Detroit and visited her tree. Too bad it was in the middle of the night and dark but she counted the steps from the sidewalk and found it. She said the stump was huge and four trunks surrounded the outside. She squished herself in through the trunks and stood in the center. How engulfing to merge with her gift to Nature once again.
However the nuts and bolts of this drama was no one got divorced in this era and it was a secret, frowned upon? Once a week Mom threw Dad’s clothes out onto the lawn, Dad ripped the phone off the wall, Missy cried in the park and her sister hid in the bathroom.
But that’s how life is, somethings come and go and we are O.K. Life isn’t a fairy tale, said Granny so lets’s make hot chocolate. I lived through it and look how strong I am. Then she picked up all six kids and balanced them, one on her head, one oh her left shin, One on her upper arms, right and left, and the last two balanced in her palms. Wow!