Yesterday was a sad day

Yesterday was a sad day for my family tree. Literally. The Elm is gone.

Backstory: My parents currently live in the home of my, now deceased, grandparents. A beautiful home in a not so beautiful automotive Midwestern town. I spent so much of my youth at this house - after school everyday, Sunday dinners, Christmas, and Thanksgiving. Always in the yard playing. The Elm was my favorite. The house, while only a half a century old, is situated on a lot that was home to a stately American Elm tree born just before the turn of the century. This 120 year old tree was the oldest living Elm in the city, a city plagued by Dutch Elm Disease that wiped out most, if not all American Elms that lined the "Pleasantville" residential streets. The folks, after spending a lot of $$ of repairs, had to replaced the sewer line (the main food source for the tree - gross, but true) due to the roots of the tree making the simple act of flushing a toilet an automatic call to Rotorooter. Last year we knew something was wrong. A large section of the tree did not leaf out.

This year - as you will see below - not a single leaf on the entire tree. A visit from the Arborist confirmed our worst fears. She was gone.

R.I.P. Sweet Elm of my youth.