Guy Smalley illustration • smmalleyart.com
The Crow Tree
I said goodbye to the “Crow Tree” today as it blew down in yesterday’s storm. The Crow Tree was personal to me and secret in many ways.
In the days leading to his death, my Grandad Ernie shared a story with me about a pet crow he had in his youth and where he got it. He remembered in detail where this tree was located, and he knew I lived near it and he described it to me. So very exacting was his recollection that I immediately knew what tree he was speaking of and that I passed it every day. The tree was, in fact, in a wooded area adjacent to my street; a woodland that had blissfully escaped the development all around it. A woodland that had provided a young boy an escape.
Grandad Ernie was a boy living in a poor area in Kentucky. It was the Great Depression and life was tough on everyone, rich or poor. Pets were a luxury and knowing his family could not afford one, and his mom strictly forbade them anyway, he set about doing what boys did then (and sometimes now), he’d catch a pet if he had to. He set about a plan and walked a few miles from home to a neighboring property, scaled a tree and captured a crow. A crow!
He loved that crow and kept it in a cage in his yard, caring for it the way you would any pet. Over his mom’s objections and his two older sisters’ fear of birds, he kept this crow and loved it. He loved it the way all kids loved their pets, wholly and without condition. A wild bird, as you would imagine, came with its own mindset, but Grandad was patient and from his account built that crow a showplace of a cage and happily boasted about him all around the neighborhood. Any kid that was within earshot of young Ernie got to learn all about his crow. But sadly, his joy would soon end.
He would recount, on his deathbed, how a neighborhood teen killed it out of jealousy, in front of him. A brutal death from an unkind youth perhaps haunted by demons of his own. Grandad was 11.
Now, to his family, this granddad was a nasty person and often brought us great sadness. He was abusive, both verbally and physically, especially to my grandmother. For whatever reason, I escaped his fists, but not his words. I lived with him now and again, in elementary school and most of every summer I can remember.
After my teens, when the freedom of both a car and a job gave me all I thought I’d ever need, I was able to avoid him when others could not. Even Grandma eventually found the strength to move on. But as he lay dying in a hospital I came, as family often does, not out of some sense of duty or pity, but because I knew he was alone and I knew he had pets that needed tending, and it was discussion of their care that led to his telling me of the crow.
70 years on, he mourned this crow in a way I did not see coming at all. It made me wonder if this event made him the way he was or if he would have been that way regardless. But, in his final hours, he seemed like that young boy again and wanted to share. Was desperate to share. Maybe he wanted to make amends and perhaps explain himself, or excuse himself. Through his tears, I knew every word was true. We forged an uneasy alliance in his final days. Our relationship still was not good, but I made promises and kept them.
From then on, every time I looked at the Crow Tree I tried to find hope and peace. It was an ash, long-dead, lanky and looked like a white ghost peering from above the rest of the trees, like a keeper of secrets in the woods. It was only a matter of time before a big wind would take it down, and it was the first thing I noticed on my morning walk. The Crow Tree had fallen.
Today, I said goodbye to the tree as I’ve said goodbye to so many familiar people and things in the last few years, the way adults must as time progresses. The natural order, if you will. I liked that silly tree, and it still had crows until the end.