A Hailing of Apples

I loved a crisp autumn morning, it was my favorite time of year. The sun would poke out in a few places kissing our leaves and the knots in my branches. Those branches would be heavy with fruit, the chilly air would give us relief from all the weight.

The mist would roll through the orchard, gently washing my leaves and fruit. On the wind, were the scents of my brothers and sisters, Gala, Kingston, Pippin, and Bramley. My roots, were we ripe, and the whole valley smelled of it.

At some point in the next few days, the farmer and his son would venture from their cabin to collect our fruit before it fell. This was before machines, back when they would gently collect every apple by hand, plucking them one by one from our limbs before plopping them into baskets at our bases.

Some of our fruit, they would take down the road, never to be seen again. You might think that sad, but I think of it more as my young ones making their way into the world, starting their own adventures before taking root in the ground. That’s what would happen to my fruit, but I swear sometimes, I can smell them on the wind pleasantly mixed with cinnamon and sugar. I can only imagine where in the world they are off to!

Much of my brother Kingston’s fruit, the farmer would keep and boil into cider. He’d sit outside the barn quartering the apples, saving the seeds to plant or sell at market. I respected the farmer for the care he took with our seeds. The farmer loved his cider, sharing it at market with pride. He loved it so much that when he would test it, he would come dance in the orchard and share some of the cider with us, poring it on the soil. Sometimes he’d even dance with the cat through the trees! And when he was done dancing he and the cat would nap at our trunks curled up together quietly.

This was the most comforting part of the year because of the harvest. We knew we were being taken care of. It was peaceful. Just how we liked it. Until that wavy haired brat arrived...

It may have been more than 350 years ago, but I remember this like it was yesterday. This young man, a seedling, really, came prancing along the road through the orchard. He was carrying a notebook and pencils loudly complaining about some plague or something. He kept shouting about how he hated to be here and how he loved school. I don’t know what a school is, but if you love them so much why don’t you go there and leave us rooted beings alone.

I detest the smell of pencils. I always thought they smelled vaguely of a long lost friend. The farmer never used pencils and I loved him for it. That was the first strike to me.

The second was when he saw the farmer's cat. The young man chased it! He would shout something about how he loved it and how he wanted to ‘Draw’ its legs. The cat climbed up into my branches escaping the man. I don’t know what a leg is, or what drawing is, but why do you need to do anything to a cat. Leave it alone. It’s a cat.

The third strike was the final one. I cannot tell you how much of an offense this man did to me. I wouldn’t wish this on any of my brothers or sisters. The only person remotely allowed to do this was the cat or the farmer. This little bastard decided that he was done chasing and cooing after the cat, that he would just SIT DOWN and LEAN against my trunk. Uninvited!

Then he continued to talk. Who was he talking to? The cat is surely not listening to you! Just blabbering on. The farmer didn’t complain this loudly. Why must you do that here! Disturber of the peace!

This young interloper, leaning on me after not deserving it, whips out his pencil and notebook to start drawing the cat. He kept going on and on about how the cat's legs acted as springs or something. He said something about the joints and how they allowed for extra propulsion. “Oh the beautiful engineering for nature!” He cried loudly. I don’t know, those are cat things and I’m a tree. Shut up.

It was beyond annoying.

Now what happened next, I am not proud of, but it happened. And for the love and memory of my fruit, I will tell it as truthfully as possible.

Below my heaviest apple, was the bastard's head. I had had it. So I did the unthinkable. I dropped it on his head.

THUNK

I don’t think it did much damage, but I thought it was a well worded complaint and that it got my point across to him. He leaped from the ground and stared at me, puzzled.

‘Yeah, that was me, you little shit.’ I thought to myself as he stood there rubbing head. He looked at me and I towered over him proudly. His eyes glanced at my fallen fruit in awe, the pain still radiating through his tiny brained head. I heard the rustling of leaves on the wind, my brothers and sisters applauding me for my efforts against the invader.

At that moment, I thought he got the message. But instead of running away like any smart squirrel or other mammal, he just stared at the apple. My little stunt couldn’t have done that much damage to his pea-sized brain that he forgot his surroundings, surely. Then he sat down. At least he was being quiet, finally. I could deal with quiet.

It took him a few minutes, but he eventually picked up my forlorn fruit, staring at it in his hand. Then he did something that made my bark curl. He tossed it up! Multiple times! Just up and down and up and down. He was playing with my sacrifice. I heard the astonishment from my surrounding trees in their awe of what this creature was doing to our fruit. My fruit was not a toy.

He would pause occasionally and scribble something in his little book. Then he would go back to launching the lost child into the air again. He repeated this again and again. Time after time, higher and higher.

If I could move my roots and devour him like how I’ve seen the farmer eat our fruit, I would have. I would have wrapped him up and beaten him with every branch and twig. I am okay with creatures eating my fruit, that’s what it’s there for, but PLAYING WITH IT?!

I could smell it in the air, the shock and awe of my fellow trees. I had made one sacrifice for our peace, but now it was time for another. I launched another red ripe attack at him. I missed entirely, but it made him lean back and question what was going on. I had him ready to run away!

And then the idiot picked up that apple too!

I was so livid, I felt as if I was about to burst into flames. This creature had destroyed the peace of our orchard without regard for those in it. This was a fight for the orchard now. I must protect our peace and my fellow orchard dwellers. If not me and if not now, we may never feel peace again. I went to war.

One by one, I threw my ripest fruit at the invader. Despite my best efforts, I didn’t hit him. I’m a tree not a catapult, but that didn’t stop me. He kept watching the fruit fall with a sick sense of curiosity, then he would collect it, and go back to his notes and scribbling. Occasionally, he’d toss an apple in the air again. It was sickening.

When I had exhausted nearly twenty apples, twenty children, I watched this man start to juggle them. He hadn’t thought that there was anything wrong with what he was doing. A tree was pelting him with its fruit and he had no sense of urgency or to flee the scene. Like, hello! We don’t want you here, don’t you get that?!

I felt I had no more options. I couldn’t hold back any longer. I sent forth a hailing of apples upon this man. More than forty children rained from my limbs down on the ground. I witnessed at least eight direct hits, with one hitting him exactly where I hit him on the head before. I heard him cry out something like “Christ almighty!” In pain.

Finally, he got the freaking message and started to back away. I could see it on his stupid face. One apple hitting him was happenstance, two was a coincidence, forty, something was up.

I was exhausted. My fruit was all spent. I had sent them all to the ground to save the peace of our orchard and won. I knew this wasn’t the end of me, but it meant the farmer would miss the opportunity to sell my fruit. But it was worth it.

I watched the disturber walk away up the road, back where he came from, back to his muttering. This time he was going on about the falling of my fruit. Something about the gravity of the event. Whatever. I never saw him come back again. Go eat a fig, Newton. Good riddance.

Peace returned to the orchard. The farmer was puzzled the next morning when he came to see all my fruit on the ground, but he didn’t seem to dwell on it for long.

From that day on, the cat and I grew closer. She understood the importance of my sacrifice to protect the orchard. Because she stayed with me, no squirrels or rodents dared to steal my fruit the next year. The next year, we had the best crop of apples with the best cider I had ever tasted.