The remembering prectice110 thread.

[sgreanbeans]

Awesome

 

[flushcut]

WOW what a great story! Thank you for sharing. I think Matt would deny all of that ever happening here on this site because you know we are tree guys and have a certain "machismo" to up hold. :hmm3grin2orange: I feel saddened that he is gone but I am glad he found a person like yourself to share a glimpse of what the other side of a tree guys really is.

 

[treeslayer]

God how I miss him, I am ate up with emotions I cannot describe.

I lost a brother.
not in battle, but in the struggle of life as a man with an overabundance of ability and character, who burned the candle at both ends, and died in one of my hotel rooms on his first storm trip. I was spotting a 70 ton on a job when I got the call from the hotel that he was unresponsive and being transported and I had to keep working. All thru the day, as I took out some huge oaks, no one would tell me his condition, but I KNEW. god how I hurt. I cursed him for not being there to rig the ground side, all the while knowing why he wasn't. when I finally hit the ground, I had my whole family and a lot of friends who were watching, give me the news.
I have known of many climbers dying while storm chasing, and I lost my brother on this one.

There is a lot to this story that needs telling, and some I probably won't.
I have some awesome pictures and stories of our storm trip, and one pic that is extremely disturbing, but says so much.

his death precipitated a nightmare for me that lasted over 3 weeks, but I am back.

matthew was one of the biggest ass holes I ever met, and I loved him for it, and for being him................

 

[treevet]

This thread has magic in it.

Miss M, thank you for such a beautiful story.

Keep your head up Dave and take care of yourself.

 

[oldirty]

hope you ok, dave.

missp110, that brought me to a sniffle. thank you for sharing.

 

[treeman75]

hope you ok, dave.

missp110, that brought me to a sniffle. thank you for sharing.

Me too

 

[deevo]

Me too

Me too, I have a wife as well as 5 & 7 year old daughters. I always hug them in the morning before I go out. Miss prentice 110 thanks for sharing.

 

[TreeAce]

Me too, I have a wife as well as 5 & 7 year old daughters. I always hug them in the morning before I go out. Miss prentice 110 thanks for sharing.

I have a similiar family and always make it a point to give out "luv you's" and kisses every morning before I lev for work. You never know. Hell, driving is none to safe either and then when you finally get to work, we hang from ropes and run chainsaws!?! LOL, I wouldnt trade it for nothin though. Nor would have Matt.
Thank you MissPrentice110 for sharing. I am glad you showed up here. I thought about swinging my wife around in circles but thought better of it LOL...I tend to get dizzy easy in my olderish age. But I sure tickled my daughters a good one! I figure that may have to work.

TreeSlayer, I am glad to hear from you.

 

[treeman75]

I thought about swinging my wife too but she is almost 9 months pregnant and I dont know if I could!

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

I give Diane a kiss and tell her I love her several times a day, never part without it.

Dave, glad to hear you are able to get back out into the swing of things. Nightmare is an understatement, i can't imagine having all that blow up at once

 

[Bigus Termitius]

Alright…how do I begin? I believe that if such things as soul mates exist, then Matthew was mine. Even though we lived worlds apart, he in the Northwestern suburbs of Chicago and me in Northwestern Germany, our paths have crossed many times and we were always drawn back into each other´s lives, most of the time not knowing about it but finding out about it later.

The first time I saw him was exactly nine years ago during a visit to Chicago in September 2002. He had just turned 21 the month before and was on his way back from a festival he had attended in the city. We met at a food corner inside of Union Station. I was sitting there with a friend of mine, sipping ginger ale, just killing time while waiting for the train.

The first thing I ever heard of Matt was him joking with his friends and his loud laugh was so outrageously obnoxious and contagious at the same time that I couldn´t help but start laughing myself. When I turned around to look at him he said “Hey there girl what´s so funny?” which made me laugh even harder. Looking at me with a curious smile he just sat down at the table next to me and started to ramble on like no other. His sense of humor was ridiculously charming. At some point he just stretched out his hand and said “Sorry I didn´t introduce myself…I´m Matt and who are you?” When I told him my German name he repeated it a dozen times until he knew how to pronounce it right. By that time the whole crowd at the food corner knew my name and was cracking up laughing. Yeah that was so like him…making everybody laugh at someone else´s expense and at the same time making a fool out of himself, too! Freakin´ hilarious!

Turns out we were waiting for the same train and I remember thinking to myself “Oh no this is goin’ to be a hell of a train ride!” Which of course it was! The conductor even asked me “Hey Lady, is this young man bothering you?” By the time I had to get off the train, Matt had succeeded in talking me into going on a date with him. Believe it or not he made me flip a dime to let fate decide whether I would meet him again or not. What a lucky son of a gun! I´m sure by the next day his whole town knew he was going out with that German chick he had picked up at the train station.

When he showed up for the date the next evening he was wearing a hippie shirt from the early `70ies with a flower design that looked like taken out of my grandma´s closet, khaki colored corduroy pants and polished brown leather shoes. Nobody in his early 20ies that I knew of would have ever gone on a date like that. He looked like he had fallen out of a quirky `70ies road movie. Wherever we went people were staring at him but he didn´t seem to care, his eyes were on me the whole time.

He took me to a café that had the best hot cocoa and chocolates in town. The time was flying by while we were talking and laughing. We had a blast! Later on he took me to the movies and we watched “A Road to Perdition”, a mafia movie, which played in Chicago during prohibition times, but that´s about all I remember, ´cause Matt did his best to really distract me, savoring every single moment. After the movie he offered to walk me all the way back to my friend´s house so he could spend even more time with me.

It was a very clear night with a moonlit sky and the whole scenery was so terribly romantic, it almost seemed unreal. While we strolled through a tree lined avenue he commented on the tree work that had been done there. And by listening to his tree stories I realized that he was as dedicated and passionate about his tree climber job as I was about working as an archaeologist in Mexico.

Sharing his love for the outdoors but being scared of heights and chain saws myself I had high respect and admiration for what he was doing. When I told him that, he just laughed it off and when I turned around to look at him he was gone.

He had jumped up to the next tree and was climbing it rapidly, making it all the way up. When he reached the top he was shouting out my name. I was totally stunned. What an unforgettable night! Spending time with him was intoxicating and I had a deep understanding of what he meant when he told me with a beaming smile: “You´ve gotta live life to the fullest!”

When it was time to say goodbye he picked me up and swirled me around in the air until I was getting dizzy and his heart was pounding heavily. And while he was kissing me passionately all of a sudden it hit me and I was absolutely sure that we would meet again…! Little did I know back then that life was not going to treat him kind and that it would take more than eight years filled with a couple of long distance overseas phone calls and letters, until I´d finally see him again…!

And last summer we even came as close to each other as being at the Niagara Falls at the exact same time without knowing about it. Each of us was hanging out at the falls with someone else that we were dating at the time. When we found out about it a couple of weeks later we were shocked by the synchronicity that in the meantime both of us had also gone through a difficult break up. That´s when it really hit us that maybe we were destined to meet again and I invited him over to Germany to spend the Christmas season with me.

Little did I know that he would die so young and that I´d be the one he´d spend his last Christmas and his last New Year´s with! Looking back on the times we had I am glad we sucked the marrow out of it. Never will I forget the last night with Matthew at my place in Germany when I played “You and I will meet again” by Tom Petty and he just picked me up and swirled me around one last time…!

Thinking about it now I´m certain I was his best kept secret and I´m pretty sure he would kill me, if he found out that I posted this story here, but I know that he´d have to come back to life to do that and I´d die gladly in his arms if I had just one more day and one more night with him!
Matthew was that kind of person you only meet once in a lifetime and my life will never be the same without him! He will always be in my heart and I will be forever thankful for the good times I got to spend with him. I miss him like crazy and can´t believe I´ll never be able to listen to his tree stories again…! Whenever life would get me down and I couldn´t sleep at night I would call him on his cell phone (he was usually still at work because of the time difference between Europe and the USA) and just listening to the chainsaws and his machinery in the background while he was shouting orders and making stupid jokes was enough to make me happy again.

And now I am here in honor of him and I´m hoping to read some tree stories once in a while, so that Matthew didn´t teach me the words stump grinder, log splitter and wood chipper for nothing! By the way while he was staying here with me in Germany for almost two months last winter I think he would have gone nuts if he hadn´t been able to check out the Arborist Site almost every night!

When I was cooking dinner for us I always heard him laughing about your jokes or the WTF pictures, he was commenting on the winter time jobs you guys had taken on and showing and explaining all the equipment to me. Not that I really understood any of the machinery you guys are using but it was fun to see how happy it made him to be talking about it.
One night we even did a virtual tour with google street view through his town so he could show me all the tree work he had done over the years. I am really glad you have been such wonderful friends and tree brothers to him! Thanks to all of you!

Alright you tree guys out there, if you have continued reading this story all the way up to here I´d like to ask you a favor in honor of Matthew. I know that being a tree climber ain´t for sissy boys and is quite dangerous, probably one of the most dangerous jobs there is, so please make sure you´ll always take good care of yourselves, and the next time you see your special Lady pick her up and swirl her around like crazy until she gets dizzy and you are breathing heavily…! You never know if it might be the last chance you´ll ever get to do that!

Like Matthew said: “You´ve gotta live life to the fullest!” And I believe that´s exactly what he did!

[video=youtube_share;H1BKxYyJJJ4]http://youtu.be/H1BKxYyJJJ4[/video]

Danke schoen, darling, danke schoen
Thank you for all the joy and pain
Picture shows, second balcony
Was the place we'd meet, second seat
Go Dutch treat, you were sweet

Danke schoen, darling, danke schoen
Save those lies, darling don't explain
I recall Central Park in fall
How I tore my dress, what a mess
I confess that's not all

Danke schoen, darling, danke schoen
Thank you for walks down Lovers lane
I can see hearts carved on a tree
Letters entertwined for all time
Yours and mine, that was fine

Danke schoen, darling, danke schoen
I wanna thank you for seeing me again
Though we go, we go our separate ways
Still the memory stays for always
My heart stays for always
My heart says danke schoen

Danke schoen, darling, danke schoen
I said thank you for
Thank you for seeing me again
Though we go, we're gonna go our separate ways
But still the memory stays for always
My heart says danke schoen

Danke schoen auf Wiedersehen
Danke schoen

 

[Nailsbeats]

Burried a child this year due to misscarriage. You can bet my girls get hugs and kisses everytime I'm around.

 

[Bigus Termitius]

I know a bit of what you've gone through, Dave, and what you'll go through. I've been there. Can't imagine trying to hold it together on a job after that. The best advice I got after my nightmare was from the responding paramedic. He said: "Ryan, don't try and get over this, just learn to cope." 17 years later I'll argue that I am over it, but only because I learned to cope first and move on, yet never forgetting.

Just take it easy, I had aftershocks within the next couple of years that sent me on some downward spirals and it's only by the grace of God that I'm around to share it. About the only thing I can say is to take the positive attributes of the life lost and add them to you. I looked forward to meeting and working with Matt. He was going to come down while he was waiting on his chip truck. I bid some moster cottonwoods with him in mind, but didn't get them.

This news hurt alot of us, each in different, but similar ways. I took it easy a couple of days and then just became more determined to be able to thank him someday for all his help, encouragement, and his 'antics.' His word for it...lol.

Nevertheless, glad your back man.

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

Burried a child this year due to misscarriage. You can bet my girls get hugs and kisses everytime I'm around.

My heart goes out to you my friend, I was two when my parents lost their oldest daughter to leukemia. Sadly i have no firm memory of her. 44 years later they still get misty when occasions remind them. It hurts my mom even more, now that she cannot get out to Debbie's grave due to her infirmities.

Diane and I get a little verkelmpt at times from my infertility (Semper Fi..yeah...right) but i know that is not the same as the heartbreak of the real loss of a life.

 

[Nailsbeats]

My heart goes out to you my friend, I was two when my parents lost their oldest daughter to leukemia. Sadly i have no firm memory of her. 44 years later they still get misty when occasions remind them. It hurts my mom even more, now that she cannot get out to Debbie's grave due to her infirmities.

Diane and I get a little verkelmpt at times from my infertility (Semper Fi..yeah...right) but i know that is not the same as the heartbreak of the real loss of a life.

I appreciate it John. Loss is loss and it hurts nomatter the details. It's a part of life and the maturing process. It should, however, serve to strengthen and unite the ones left to cope. My thoughts anyhow.

 

[flushcut]

I was thinking about p110 today as I was "working in Disneyland" it was a yard full of garden gnome type of garbage and every other form of nick-nack. I think it took us longer to clear the LZ than it did to do the job.

 

[Scrat]

Hey Prentice
been a few days Just checkin' in, keeping the flame lit and passing the torch.......

 

[flushcut]

I miss that guy. :msp_sad:

 

[oldirty]

didn't realize it till the other day but he wrote on my wall here at AS. i do miss some of the humor he brought to this place and he was a skilled player so we all will miss out on some of his insight he could've shared with what he was looking at.

don't worry flushcut. he'll be with you on every tree you climb.


stay safe.

 

[treeslayer]

I miss my yankee buddy........miss you too flushcut. least you want to be here........:msp_sad: