Dear Peach Tree Bandit(s)

So you took the opportunity while the nation’s attention was focused on an organized crime trial in New England to pick the peach tree clean? Was the trial a ruse you engineered to divert attention from your local operation? Did you use the peach tree as an educational outing for your brood, introducing them to a life of banditry? How many of you were there? Considering that the tree was loaded with peaches from top to bottom, considering that some branches were weighed down with clusters of peaches bowing to the ground, considering that the deed was done in a matter of days, in less than one week – surely this is the work of a gang with a wily mastermind. Only a carefully orchestrated operation could have removed every last peach. Only a mind able to encompass the entire tree, every branch, every twig, every peach, could have issued assignments based on number of peaches, height of limbs, and weight of peaches in each cluster. And to leave no evidence! Surely you are a master of clandestine operations!

I trust you enjoyed watching me spray the tree…once…twice…thrice…how many times did I foolishly do it? You must have snickered as you watched me spray with that heavy backpack pump sprayer, each time ensuring that I had top to bottom coverage of the tree, each time making sure that the underside of the branches were well-spayed as the topside. Did you video my futile efforts to bring home peaches? Did you play the video for your gang, instructing them to wait till the last possible moment before striking, before stealing every last peach from the tree? Not even leaving me, a son of Adam, one out of every ten peaches?

No doubt you watched me take a sample of two peaches home for my wife, a daughter of Eve, to inspect; no doubt that was the moment when you knew that you must launch your invasion before another weekend passed, no doubt the die was cast on that fateful Saturday morning as I left the garden and the peach tree – naively thinking that a harvest of peaches awaited the next weekend.

At least your fellow bandit who has played Attila the Hun with our tomatoes had the good sense to tease us by allowing some to remain, thus giving us hope for next year – but you, you would rob us of all hope for peaches; you would stomp our desire underfoot, you would rob our wallets of money paid for fruit tree spray…did I mention that you and yours took every last peach?

That’s okay…I have a plan.