“Breaking up a
tree fight on your property is one of the hardest things you will
ever do,” I tell my incredulous seven-year-old nephew.
We are both
reluctant guests at a wedding reception. Across the room the DJ puts
on Abba's 'Fernando' in an attempt to stir some life into a stagnant
dance floor, at present populated solely by the bride and groom who
are slow-dancing and oblivious to their surroundings. On the fringes,
where the varnished blonde wood meets with an expanse of
coral-coloured carpet, a young bridesmaid gyrates shyly next to one
of the circular tables. A partly-folded linen napkin that still
resembles a swan, lies crushed on the floor in the shadows near her
feet.
“Even harder
than extremal combinatorics?”
“Yes, far harder
than that. I would say twice, or maybe even three times as hard as
what you just said.”
If the archives at the Museum of
Southend are to be believed, it took the combined efforts of 47
consecutive generations of my family to break up a vicious
bare-branch fight between a pair of oak trees.
The unseemly spat occurred on the front
lawn of the family home, in plain sight of the church across the
road. One can only imagine the effect that such commonplace violence
must have had upon the children who dwelled within the property and
who, upon peering through the front windows, would have been greeted
by the brutish spectacle of the trees beating seven bells out of
each other.
It was my ancestor Andrew Sadler who
first noted the bough of one of the oaks extending towards its
neighbour in a threatening manner, while the other tree appeared to
lean provocatively forward, a leering hollow in the trunk mouthing
the word: “Tosser.”
Sadler sternly admonished both trees.
The following morning the entire family convened beneath their leafy
canopies to recite passages from the New Testament and sing hymns.
These readings from the holy scriptures
did nothing to improve the moral characters of the skirmishing oaks.
If anything hostilities between the pair escalated.
42 years later Andrew Sadler's
great-grandson, John, was the subject of slanderous gossip spread by
Alan Webster – the then patriarch of a family who have been our
rivals since the 1500s. Recently their eldest son, Derek, beat me to
the position of Assistant Manager at World of Toner.
Alan Webster swore before the Bishop of
Lincoln that he had witnessed John Sadler watering the two oaks on
the Sabbath with a barrel of beer “thereby making both trees drunk
and belligerent and mindful to continue in their ceaseless brawling
which has so demeaned the character of our fair village.”
An account of life in Southend at this
time refers to the Sadler household as “a rowdy establishment of
ill-repute, where outside a pair of great oaks do battle with one
another, while at night crowds of ne'er-do-wells gather and place
bets upon the eventual outcome.”
Ironically it took a war to force a
break in the hostilities: In 1915 both trees were drafted into the
army and served on the continent in separate regiments. They returned
to England unscathed in early 1919, having each attained rank of
captain. After a brief armistice they resumed their violence towards
each other with renewed vigour.
In 1961, a policeman called at the
family home late in the evening. It was my grandfather, Harry, who
opened the door to him, whereupon he was informed of a complaint
raised by neighbours regarding a fearsome cacophony taking place in
the front garden: The incessant rustling of leaves and the sound of
acorns falling and striking the ground, long after the 8pm curfew for
such activities had passed.
My grandfather appeared before a
justice of the peace the following morning where he was made to
formally apologise for the disturbance and swear an oath pledging to
make renewed efforts to end the fighting. For a while there was talk
that both oaks might be removed and transferred to the infamous tree
prison at Kew Gardens. However a judge, upon considering the facts of
the case, and taking into account the military ranks of the trees and
their past service to this country, instead imposed a sentence of 160
hours community service a piece, along with an Antisocial Behaviour
Order, preventing either tree from venturing within 50 yards of
Southend High Street.
In 2007 I obtained permission from the
council to plant a pair of two Estonian Judo Trees on my property.
Despite their fearsome nomenclature, their purpose is to act as
mediators, restraining the oaks and preventing any further punches
from being thrown until such a time that “everyone takes a chill
pill and calms the fuck down.”
~
“Do you see now why, if you hope to
lead any kind of normal life you must leave Southend and go far away.
And perhaps change your surname?”
My nephew nodded silently.
The opening notes of the doom metal
classic 'Corpsecycle' filled the function suite. I watched as
generations of two families, brought together by a marriage, rose to
their feet and flooded the dance floor.
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