“Marked for death”: Felld Weeping Willow brings tears to the harbor boys

If a tree falls into a forest and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound?

A special tree certainly did it -a victim of the youngest ice storm, which devastated large parts of the Simco County area -when he hit the floor with a dull blow and hit a chord with a Barrie family.

Ryan Capisciolto, who is nine years old and lives in the northeastern corner of the city near the Grove Street East and the Penetianguishen Road, mourns the loss of the loss of his favorite tree, which he has admired for years.

Every year of his life, Ryan posed for a photo with the tree.

The crying pasture, which was located in the nearby Rellenhurst Park, was damaged enough by the ice storm that the City crews found that it had to come down.

It was fallen on May 12th.

The tree offered a lot of shadows for the playground and was the perfect place for people.

The annual photo ritual started when Ryan was only one year old.

“As we cleaned up, my father thought it was funny to put Ryan in the tree,” said Ryan's mother Melissa. “We took a few pictures and thought:” Oh, we should do it every year until we can no longer fit. “And it worked out pretty well.”

The collection had grown to 10 photos. Usually they take the photos in autumn, but lately they have taken some new ones because they knew that the tree should be reduced.

“We went right after the ice storm because we were worried about it,” she said. “It still stood, so we thought we would be good.”

A short time later, Melissa saw a social media post that said the tree was marked at the distance.

Ryan's mother got down to tell him, but he thought she would just be deleted.

“Ryan ran with some friends with his bike and he saw that the tree had a large orange 'X' – marked for death,” she said.

At first Ryan was pretty quiet, she said, but then there were tears for a few nights at bedtime.

“He tried to stick together, but the emotions would defeat him before going to bed,” added Melissa.

Ryan was on his way to school in the car when he saw the crew in the park to cut the tree.

After leaving him, Melissa went to the park to collect a piece of the tree for her son as a souvenir.

“I was somehow surprised when she pulled me out of school and said:” Come on it “, and then she opened the trunk,” he said.

At first he thought he was in trouble and wondered what was in the trunk.

“And then I see that (tree slices) and she is like 'I have a piece of it,” said Ryan.

He was very satisfied with his mother's action.

Melissa said the city team that felled the tree was more than helpful than she came up and asked about the souvenir.

“Here I am approaching you and try to talk to you without crying, and I thought I had this crazy request for you, but you were so nice. I just couldn't thank you enough,” she said.

What will he do with the piece of wood? “It's in our back yard, but every year instead of taking a photo in the tree … I will hold it (it).

In the meantime, the family plans to find out how the wood can keep the decay so that they can last as long as possible.

Would Ryan consider planting his own tree to replace the old one and enjoy it?

“Yes,” he said, after considering the idea for a moment. “I will probably be dead if it gets that big again.”

The time perspective of a boy may not be as wide as the rest of us, but after 80 or 90 years, every newly planted tree should be quite considerable.

“It just started as a funny joke and was an annual tradition that we were looking forward to – and we will definitely miss it,” said Melissa about the annual photos with Willow.

“We have to find a new tree, maybe in the Sunnidale Park or elsewhere in the city.”