We had a bizarre little tree in our backyard. It was planted by the previous owners, who apparently bought many of our fixtures and features on clearance at a two-bit dollar store. This little tree was probably out by the back dumpster waiting for her Charlie Brown. It was a scribble of a tree. After living here for nearly nine years, it did grow several feet, but it was a complete underachiever compared to the other trees in our yard.

We aren’t gardeners, but we figured out it was some sort of hybrid maple. Last summer, it sputtered. This year, leaves didn’t sprout. We put it on the bucket list of spring chores I wrote about a few months ago. It had to go.

A few nights ago, my husband was outside on the patio grilling a school of bratwursts. Teddy was with him, playing nearby. The tree, just a few feet from the patio, caught my husband’s eye. He walked over to it and shook it, finding it slightly loose in the ground. Teddy watched as my husband grabbed the trunk and yanked. The tree popped out of the lawn, plucked completely free. He tossed it into some rocks bordering the patio and returned to the grill as if he had simply uprooted a dandelion.

When a three-year-old boy witnesses his daddy muscling a tree out of the earth, he is impressed. “Whoa! Dad! You got down the tree all by yourself?!” It’s safe to say Teddy was gobsmacked.

I can hear the cartoon theme music now:

Who grills tasty sausages? (BAM!)
Who fells disappointing trees? (BAM!)
Casually! Handsomely! Skillfully!
All with a confident ease. (BAM!)

He’s Daddyman! Daddyman!
Making it right when a tree is wrong!
He’s Daddyman! Daddyman!
The kind of guy who inspires his blogging wife to sit at her keyboard creating an entire imaginary TV show, complete with costume choices, set design, and a bevy of villains, expressed in a poorly-written song!

If ever there was a moment when a little boy believed his dad was a superhero, that was it.

I’ve known it for years. Happy Father’s Day to all the Super Daddymen.