Coming Home to Sugar Pines

We love getting correspondence from  sugar pine fans.  Dennis Babson recently wrote us the story of how he came to know and love  sugar pines as a young boy:

I saw my first sugar pine in 1952.  I was 7 and my family was in the process of moving to Grass Valley, CA.  I remember the long trips we made that summer from Los Angeles.  That was before the freeways we enjoy now; it took over 8 hours of driving without counting stops and flat fire repairs – remember those?
 
When we made those frequent trips back and forth trying to get settled, I remember saying, "Are we getting close yet?" from the rear seat.  I gazed out the rear window at all the pine trees whizzing by when we got out of Auburn.  I began to notice one unusual pine when we were about 5 miles away from our destination.  It was tall, but it didn't look like the others.  It had long branches perpendicular to the trunk, and the ends were kind of drooping, and they had these long cones at the ends.  From then on, whenever I saw those trees, I knew we were almost there.  Years later I found out that I was looking at sugar pines.  There weren't a lot of them around, but every once in a while I'd see one or two – they were easy to spot.  I've loved them ever since.
 
Thanks, Dennis, for sharing your story with us!