With the last sands of August slipping through the hourglass, the winds of September have already arrived in full force. And this afternoon, following an alarm on my phone by only a very few minutes — enough for me to rush around the house battening down windows and doors, and enough to quickly hustle Carley out for a pre-downpour potty break — the sky darkened dramatically and an end-of-summer weather burst blasted through Essex. Although the entire dramatic affair last only minutes, the storm damage was significant.
The photograph above and the next one below capture the startling aftermath of a large, old maple tree growing just west of the old tennis court. I was aware that fairly significant rot had begun to compromise the tree, but I grossly underestimated how little unrotten trunk the grand old tree was relying upon to stay upright.