My little brother Paul and I were city slickers. In our small town, this meant that we lived on the border between Winslow, Arizona (population 9,000—on parade day) and Bushman Acres (population zero—on parade day), which was unincorporated Navajo County land. It was only a five-minute bike ride from our house in Winslow to Josh’s home in Bushman Acres, but we were slickers nonetheless.
In Bushman Acres, people could burn their trash in barrels and have horses. The cousins in Bushman Acres could brand cattle, bail hay, and mend barbed-wire fences, but we didn’t—couldn’t—although we tried. We were slickers, through and through.
One Sunday, my family went to visit my Grandpa. We visited Grandpa on Sundays and holidays, and we usually got together for cousins’ birthdays, too. We got together all the time. That was the way the Hancock clan showed love. Josh lived right next door to Grandpa, and when we arrived to visit that day, I could see him from the window of our minivan.
In the driveway of my Grandpa’s yard, just before you got to the carport, was a mammoth, 50 ft. tall, gnarled cottonwood tree.
Josh had constructed a fort high in the tree. As we drove up, he sat in the branches, fiddling with some sort of handlebar connected to a cable. The cable ran down from the tree at an extremely steep angle—87.93 degrees at least—and ended on the top rung of a pull-up bar that my Grandpa had created out of metal plumbing materials.
I think Josh had been waiting for an audience. As we pulled in, he wrapped his hands around the handlebar, and—“whoosh!”—down the zip line he went, supersonically. When he hit the end of the line, he swung up, swiveled back, and dropped three feet to the ground.
“Whoa!” I said.
“That’s crazy!” replied my brother as we got out of the car. My parents walked inside to visit with Grandpa. Paul and I stayed outside. This was awesome.
“You like it?” Josh asked, beaming. I nodded. Paul raised an eyebrow.






































Love it! Especially the gnarled tree.