From: gorillalover_99@yahoo.com Bowen and the Maple Tree It was June when HE moved in to the neighborhood. A hot dry June. The first heat wave hit the day HE moved. The next day HE decided to do some yard work just as I walked past his home. There are events and times in your life you recall with crystal clarity. A moment becomes frozen in time like a snapshot stored in the brain. This day was one such moment for me. I saw him from behind as I walked towards the house. He sported a back that was a couple of ax handles wide and all coated with a delicious blanket of rugged brown fur. HE had muscles and cable like sinew running across that back creating hills and valleys of muscle shaded by a forest of man fur. HE stood hands on hips looking at the tree that had stood in that yard for several years. It was a Maple maybe 25' high and perhaps a foot in circumference. HE was tall enough to reach to the lower branches without use of a ladder. I watched as a thick catchers mitt of a right hand extended to the lowest branch and grabbed hold. The branch was thick enough that he couldn’t close his considerable hand around it. HE tensed the muscles of that right arm and I watched in awe as knots and lumps and ropes of muscle rose mightily along his gorilla arm. The fur was a couple inches thick and so dense you could not see skin but you could still see the power oozing beneath. The branch bent impossibly followed by an immediate ear splitting crack as it was torn from the trunk. HE quickly took the branch and snapped it into several manageable pieces and tossed the remains into a pile. HE continues to strip the tree this way until HE had sheared away all of the branches that HE could reach. Next he walked to the tree and threw those massive gorilla arms around its trunk. HE grunted and groaned as HE began to squeeze and at the same time twist the trunk. The earth shook and the ground trembled at the ferocious display of savage brute man power. After but a few moments the tree was still attached to its considerable roots but HE had lifted it more than two feet out of mother earth. HE stepped back a bit and now placed both hands on either side of the trunk and began to twist and twirl the tree around. The great tree shook violently in the hands of this modern day Hercules. I heard the sounds of roots snapping and popping. I could see the effort was swelling his massive arms and shoulder muscles and chest. Finally HE locked it once more in a bear hug and heaved mightily. With a rush of fury and accompanied by a sound of the earth groaning the tree tore free. He held it and turned and set the great tree down to the ground safely. Though his home was only a few feet away it never felt so much as a brush from its now felled neighbor. After letting the tree gently back to the ground now on its side HE turned and for the first time saw that I had watched. "Oh didn’t see you there son. Names Bowen. I just moved in" HE said in a voice so deep and resonant that it could only from the likes of him. HE stood there with a smile across his ruggedly handsome face. His great chest heaved from his efforts and his arms and torso were swelled to the point of skin tearing. I stood as erect as a 13 year old can get after witnessing such a display. I hesitated and then spoke the only word that was appropriate. I nodded my head up and down slightly and said in a low hushed voice "SIR".