Sunday, February 15, 2009

Further out on a limb



With no low branches to climb, I used a rope thrown over a limb to climb the tree. It was with this same rope that I hauled board after board up into the tree. Working like an ant I climbed up and down the rope ,tying on boards and hauling them up until I had enough to start construction.
Slowly, the treehouse took shape. For a long time it was simply a platform that I unwisely covered with an old piece of carpet which acted as a sponge. Later, when I was able to scavenge more lumber, the treehouse began to look more like a treehouse. 


 Much of my motivation for building the treehouse was fueled by the many books I read as a kid. Books like Henry's Clubhouse and The Mad Scientists' Club spurred me on to create a headquarters from which I could carry out my elaborate schemes. While these schemes and plans never quite matched their fictional counterparts and in many cases existed only in my mind, they nonetheless, were high-powered fuel for my ever active imagination and creative whims. 
For all my vivid plans for my headquarters in the sky, I only camped out in it once. Eventually, gravity and nature won. The continual swaying and twisting of the trees in the wind over the years caused the nails to work their way loose and the whole thing came tumbling down. By then it didn't really matter, all the hard work, the dreams and plans, because ultimately a maker  lives to make.

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