13—The Ending of the Very Long and True Story

As Lucy and Hannah sat at the kitchen counter and sipped their hot chocolate, Adora Birch began telling the final chapter of her story:

The log truck rolled away from the forest and traveled through the night. The following afternoon, we
arrived at the factory of the Saw Mill People.

"Were you scared?" Lucy asked.

"It's very hard to explain," Adora Birch replied, "trees don't get scared in the same way people do. We go from being vertical to being horizontal. Do you know what those two words mean?"

"Vertical means up and down," Lucy said. "But horizontal is sideways."

"Exactly right," replied Adora Birch. "And being horizontal for a tree means it has come to the end of its tree life and is on its way to becoming something else. Change takes a lot out of us, just as it often does for people.”

A tear fell down Hannah’s cheek and dropped into her hot chocolate. "Dora
tree gone," she said with a quivering lip.

“Come now, my little friend,” Adora Birch said. “Look at that picture over there on Great Aunt Nature Walker’s wall. It’s your daddy with your Uncle Brian. What would happen if they hadn’t changed?” 

Lucy laughed. “They would still dress funny and not go to work. Then my daddy would not be there with my mother to take care of us. And we couldn't go on vacation to see Uncle Brian."

Hannah was not convinced. “Dora tree change hurt,” she said."Truck big scary."

“Well, now,” Adora Birch said, “perhaps we should ask Great Aunt Nature Walker if change makes her scared.”

Great Aunt Nature Walker laughed. “Oh indeed,” she said. “I remember I was so scared the first day I went to school I threw up my pancakes all over my new shoes!”

Lucy and Hannah laughed.

“And,” Great Aunt Nature Walker went on, “the night before I left home for college, I sat on the floor of my closet and cried. My mother was looking all over the house for me.” She paused. “Now sometimes I wake up at night feeling very worried about getting so old I can no longer walk in the forest or take care of my house.”

“You will never get that old,” Lucy said.

“Oh but I will,” Great Aunt Nature Walker said, then added quickly, “Not for a long time, though, if I continue to eat my vegetables.”

“I was a little bit nervous when I went to pre-school,” Lucy admitted.

“Dora story change!” said Hannah who was now feeling considerably more cheerful and eager to move on.

“Well then,” Adora Birch said, “I will tell you that it was a very odd feeling for my tree and me to be cut off from the Earth and taken away from our Forest. We could not have imagined the adventure of change that lay before us.” And as Lucy and Hannah sipped their hot chocolate, Adora Birch continued her story:

The noise and long bumpy ride on the truck was very different from our peaceful life in the Forest. And I was very worried—especially when we got to the factory of the Saw Mill People and a machine with big metal jaws lifted us off our truck and put us in huge piles. We lay for several long days before getting kerplunked right into a large tank of water.

My tree was just getting very soft and relaxed in the water when we got  loaded onto a machine that carried us through rollers to remove our bark. 

We then were carried along a track to another machine that shaved off all my tree's uneven spots. So then it was a nice smooth log.

After that we got rolled round and round like a paper towel roll. And a very sharp blade started shaving off very thin sheets of wood—just as if you were unrolling paper towels from a roll. Round and round we went until there was nothing left of my tree but a thin rod. I have arranged for a little video of this before we go on. 

I ended up in one of those sheets. And then I got sent with all the other sheets into a very hot oven to dry us all out. After we were all dried out, we got cut into smaller sheets. And would you believe it, I got cut in half right down my middle. Then I got stacked up, one half of me on top of the other half and sent with the rest of the pile to a door factory.

On the way, I was trying to be quite brave and said to myself, "Adora Birch, it's been very nice

knowing the other half of you."
"Indeed," I replied to myself. But the truth is, I did not know how I would live as only half a wood spirit.

At the door factory, there were many doors made out of bits and pieces of very plain boards cut from the blade of a saw. They were waiting to be covered by very interesting and beautiful sheets of wood like me. And what do you think happened! A kind man noticed me in the pile.

"Hey, there, Jeffrey," he called to another man, "will you look at this."
"Well, I declare, Milo," exclaimed Jeffrey, "that will make some lucky person a very nice door."

Milo was very good at matching sheets up to
make nice patterns. And before I knew it, he had matched me up with myself and glued me onto a door. If he hadn't been careful, I would have looked all squiggly and confused.

Squiggly and Confused

Sanding and Polishing

Then after my glue got all dried out in another oven, Jeffrey put me
on a machine that polished me up.

When the truck came to take me to the door store, Milo said, “Well, little wood lady, I did the best I
could for you."
Then Jeffrey knocked on me for luck, "Let’s just hope the people who buy this wonderful door take time to see you and don't just hang you on your doorframe upside down.”

Milo closed the door of the truck, and off I went with the other doors on another long and bumpy journey to the door store.

I missed my tree and was now extremely worried about getting hung upside down in a cold dark place.

The Door Store

At the door store, Steve lined me up with the other doors for customer viewing. The very next day, a man named Alex the Contractor came to pick out a door. “That’s the one!” he exclaimed pointing at me. 

Then Steve drilled a hole in my door for the doorknob, after which Alex the Contractor lifted me into his big yellow truck, and off I went for another ride in the sunshine on a winding road lined with trees. It was not a very long ride before Alex the Contractor lifted my door out of his truck and carried us through the garage of a little white house and into a kitchen

There he called out, “Hello, Great Aunt Nature Walker! You are not going to believe this.”

“Believe what?” said Great Aunt Nature Walker. 

“Will you look at this,” said Alex the Contractor pointing right at me.

Great Aunt Nature Walker 's eyes grew wide with delight as she touched my little face. "I believe," she said, "you have brought me the best door in the whole world." 

Alex the Contractor

And when Alex the Contractor had finished putting hinges on me and hanging me on my new doorframe, Great Aunt Nature Walker said to him, “I think my little Wood Spirit needs a name. What do you think about Adora Birch?”

“I think it is the perfect name,” replied Alex the Contractor.

Well, I was feeling very happy. But then as Alex the Contractor was leaving, he said to Great Aunt Nature Walker. “Now you must paint or varnish your new door to protect it. Otherwise the cold and damp in the garage or warp will mildew it. And the heat from Woody the Stove will warp it."

“Oh dear,” Great Aunt Nature Walker said when Alex the Contractor had driven away, “what will I do. I cannot paint or varnish over you, my new little friend.” 

At first Woody the Stove offered to stop eating wood. But that wasn’t good.

And that night it rained as if to say, "I am rain. This is what I do, and I have no intention of stopping." The next morning, my door was damp on the garage side and became very hot as Woody the Stove burned up his breakfast wood. That night when Great Aunt Nature Walker went to sleep, my door got cold. I was very lonely without my tree around me.

So on the day when Great Aunt Nature Walker went to the store for paint, I was thinking it would be very sad not to be able to look out of my door. But maybe it would be good to have a nice coat of paint to keep me warm.

However, as you can see, Great Aunt Nature Walker had a very good idea, don't
you agree?
Lucy and Hannah laughed and clapped. For Adora Birch's door was the very best door they had ever seen.

"And that," Adora Birch said, "is the end of the very long and true story of how my door grew out of a seed and how I ended up this door."

"You  know," said Great Aunt Nature Walker, "my father was a very wise man. He always liked to say every story has a moral. A moral can be a lesson learned. Or a thought you take with you to help you along the years to change and grow. Can you think of a moral to The Very Long and True Story of Adora Birch?"