By Mary Alice Murphy

The latest in the nightly-large-critter saga took place Monday evening. I was still up and the lights inside were still on, but I heard the bear crunching on an apple. He sure makes a lot of noise when he eats.

Probably 10 or 15 minutes later, I heard an enormous crash with the distinct sound of wood breaking. I flipped on the outside lights, but they aren’t terribly bright and are pointed mostly downward, so as not to pollute our wonderful night skies. I do like to watch meteor showers and the phases of the moon.

So, other than knowing that something wooden, like branches of a tree, had broken, I didn’t fully realize the damage until daylight showed me I had a mess to clean up.

Fortunately, I got sleep that night, because either I slept through bear’s return or he was quieter than usual.

Oh, yeah, he left immediately after the crash. He didn’t stick around at all. I have no idea if he is injured and I hope not badly, but I also didn’t hear him last night, but then with not much sleep the past few nights, I was still pretty tired.

In the light of day, I realized that two large branches full of apples had completely torn away from the tree, not at all neatly. Simply a large gash of raw wood where the two split away.

I figure what he did was try to get up to the tippy top of the dying peach tree to get the last peaches that even I with a tall picker couldn’t reach. And it’s precarious up there, so I figure he fell, because the two branches that tore away were directly under the part of the peach tree with the remaining few peaches. I’ll leave them to the birds or whoever eats them off the ground.

I probably have enough for a peach crisp when I find time to make one, soon, before they get too ripe.

And yesterday, after hauling away the large branches, lots of apples were left on the ground. I picked up a few of the not yet ripe apples that weren’t bruised, and invited a friend over to get some, too.

When life hands you lemons, you make lemonade. When bears hand you unripe apples, you make applesauce and add some sugar. That’s what I did yesterday afternoon. And it’s good!

May your musings bring you beauty!