Popski walked the short distance from his front door to the large Oak tree that overhung the gate to Brightdown village. It was under the great sweeping arms of this Oak that he usual took shelter if the rain was heavy or the sun too hot. Popski had heard tales when he was a small child of great trees that walked and spoke to one another in a language of their own making. Popski imagined what he would do if this tree suddenly decided it had had enough sitting around and got up and walked off.
Popski knocked out the old pipe weed from his pipe on the gnarled bark of the tree and whispered a quick “sorry”, just in case. He refilled and lit the pipe and savored the rich sweet aroma. All in all it was not a bad profession being a gate keeper, the gate pretty much looked after itself, the tree thankfully remained in the same spot every day and apart from the occasional Brightdown resident or delivery to the local provisions store it was calm and peaceful part of The Shire.
There were times when he would think “Why does this gate need keeping anyway?” but he always came to the same conclusion that it had always had a gate keeper and nothing bad had ever happened so it was probably best to keep things as they were, just in case, besides if there was no gate keeper he would not have the job and there were a lot of jobs out there that required far more effort.
From inside the Burrow the kettle lid began to rattle as it boiled and Popski tucked the pipe away and hurried back to the front door. He stopping half way to turn round and give the Oak a nice low bow, just in case.
