Family Tree: A Homecoming

Watch the video: This is one of my beautiful ENG 343 students, Elizabeth Fields Mason. She and her new husband are participating in a Murray State tradition, the decoration of the Shoe Tree in the campus quadrangle. (Click on the link above for more on this tradition and to see the tree from another angle).



Something old: That ancient oak tree. It's been struck by lightning and no longer branches or buds with leaves, but every spring and fall it blossoms with shoes, like the bumper of a honeymoon getaway car.

Something new: On April 30, 1987, up went:

* A black motorcycle boot (something borrowed from James Dean);

* A high-heeled Nina pump (something blue);

* A Nike so small it fit into the palm of my hand, its swoosh no bigger than an eyebrow.

Harvey nailed these shoes to Murray’s Shoe Tree to commemorate our marriage the day before. When I asked him why there were three shoes, he said, “I married both of you.”

I can remember our first breakfast date, when Harvey came for omelets at my house, Daniel ran toward him, yelling, “Hardees!” Daniel had never left me for anyone else, and I was jealous to see him leap into Harvey’s arms. It took me three months to follow Daniel there, but I did. And he married both of us—me legally and Daniel as the child of his heart.

Today, that 2-year-old turns 26, and it’s his first birthday without Hardees around to dig into the ice cream and snitch an extra piece of cake. We both miss our fella today.

Raleigh, sister to Daniel and daughter to Hardees, misses him, too. Her tiny patent Mary Jane went up in August 1997, back when her toes were no larger than green peas.

Happy Birthday, Dan! Your father, sister, and I love you very much.