The New Roy

We have dead trees in our yard.

Well, I should say we had dead trees in our yard.

When we first moved into our home, Roy was concerned about this very large tree that was just on the outskirts of the driveway as it was mainly dead. If it fell on the house, it would do considerable damage. And so, he asked a guy who cut down trees to give us an estimate on how much it would cost to bring it down.

$1500.

Thanks but no thanks. We shall do it ourselves.

And so, a couple of weeks ago, Sean Swayze was visiting and Roy decided it was time to get the job done.

Sean has been with us since he was a freshman in academy in Missouri.  Of course, he's far beyond academy days as he graduated in 2010, but he was always a big supporter of Roy, and our family in general, so pretty much he's just family. He lives in Colorado but as he has a lot of friends here in Keene, and he's especially fond of his dentist in Burleson, we see him on occasion. Anyway, Sean is wiry and youthful and can do things that Roy just doesn't do these days, and course, this boy knows how to work. He's kind of a beast actually.

Roy and Sean started on the trees in our yard (we had a fully dead tree in the back yard that had to come down) early on a Sunday morning. By that night, they were only partially done with the tree in the driveway. But by the end of Tuesday evening, it was as down as it was going to get. All that is left is an 8 foot "stump" that will, most likely, come down in due time. But for now? Well, the lumberjack in all of us has pretty much skipped town.

Every day I take Jace to school at 7:30 a.m. I back out of the garage, carefully eyeing the "tree stump" in my backup camera, and then pull out of our driveway and head off into the sunset (or, as in this case, the sunrise...)

Well, this morning Jace was running late. And so I partially backed out of the garage and hung there for a minute, getting a tad more impatient with each passing second. When he finally walked out the door and got in the car, I began my mini-lecture:

"Jace, you're not the only one in the world here. After I take you to school, I have to come back home, eat breakfast, and get myself out the door so that I can be there by 8:00! That's difficult to do when..."

BONK.

Yeah. That happened.

I hit the tree.

I sighed, threw the car in gear, and jumped out to survey the damage. And there, at the top of the car trunk, was a definite dent that most definitely had not been there before.

Jace was just happy that I was off my soapbox. "Is there a dent?" he asked, just a little too happily.

"No, it's just fine," I lied.

After I dropped Jace at school and drove back home, I parked the car in the garage, took a picture of the damage, and called Roy. As he was in a meeting, his voice was quiet when he answered the phone.

"Roy? Um...I backed out of the garage and I hit the tree. Don't kill me. There's a dent in the trunk where there wasn't a dent before."

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"I'm fine."

"Does the trunk open?"

"Yeah - it's not that big of a dent. But there's definitely a dent now."

"Oh well. Those things happen. Don't worry about it. I gotta go - I'm in a meeting."

And then he hung up.

He didn't even sound irritated.

Okay, wait. This is Roy. Do you know Roy? Roy is a perfectionist. He likes everything spotless and perfect. That means we don't drive cars with dents in them.

But this Roy?

Wow.

I don't know what he did with my husband, but I think I'll keep this new guy around for awhile.

Meanwhile, I bet that tree stump isn't long for the world. I could be wrong...but I'm thinking Roy won't want to take any more chances. At least the old Roy wouldn't.

We'll wait and see what this new Roy chooses to do.