When you grow up in the same neighborhood, same apartment building, for your entire life, you tend to know the features of your surroundings almost like the back of your hand. I knew the trees that framed the entrance to my building very well. How in the spring, they would bloom these white petaled flowers. They would stay well into summer, with vibrant green leaves that made the trees look so full. In the fall, the leaves would turn from green to yellows, reds, and browns. 

I remember loving the experience of stepping on the crunchy leaves as I walk would walk home from school. They created shade from both sides, that almost gave the feeling of safety and security.  I remember at one point when I came back home for a holiday break from school while I was in undergrad, I almost immediately knew that there was something different about the outside of the building. Even though I had arrived home in the middle of the night I just knew something was missing. It wasn't until I was heading out to go somewhere that I realized that the thing that was missing was one of the trees. The tree that was on the right side of the entrance, closest to the street corner was gone, all that was left to show that it had once been there was the stump, though it was cut very low. This now left only trees on the left side of the entrance. I remember asking my mom about the tree being cut down, and she wasn't really sure why but suggested that it might have been dying. It didn't make sense to me, how could all of the other trees be fine but this one tree had to be cut down?  

I still do not know for sure why this tree was cut, but it still to this day feels like something is missing whenever I leave my apartment building.