DOOM KABOOM

The infamous Kaboom! Tree, as it appeared three years ago.

Regular readers of this site may recall this post about the Kaboom! tree, a well-known and well-feared landmark near the home of Eric the Blade. Well-feared, indeed: Many a careless motorist has dashed his or her brains out against the Kaboom! tree over the years, owing to its strategic placement adjacent to a sharp bend in the road by which it sits. It’s a tree that has earned its onomatopoetic nickname.

It was a beautiful tree, the Kaboom! tree, despite its fearsome reputation. In the photograph above, taken in October 2006, you can get an idea of its proportions, the massive bole supporting a huge, leafy canopy.

Alas, while trees are, on the whole, long-lived life forms, even they are not immune to the ravages of Time and Nature. Eric informed me yesterday that the violent storms that swept through his area this Friday past wiped out the Kaboom! tree - or at least wailed upon it with sufficient intensity that it will never be the same again. Only about a quarter of the tree remains.


The infamous Kaboom! Tree on Easter Sunday 2009, badly in need of resurrection (it’s the one on the left). Photo courtesy Eric the Blade.

The Great Karmic Wheel spins ever ’round, Esteemed Readers... one day, the Mighty Oak is on top, the bane of careless drivers throughout McMinn County, Tennessee, and then, whammo! - it is humbled, a mere shadow of its former glory. As our High Holiday liturgy would put it, in the solemn, timeless words of the U-netaneh Tokef prayer, every year the Eternal One decides “who shall live and who shall die... who shall be exalted and who shall be brought low...” - and everyone gets a turn in the barrel.

Even if you’re a tree.

Kaboom! tree, we hardly knew ye. Ave atque vale...