I stood at the bus stop. I waited for the Riverside Drive M5 bus around 6:30 pm. I was later than usual coming home from work. It was still a sunny, hot evening.

I heard a crash like thunder: a gut-wrenching, tearing sound.

I looked at the road. Nothing. The sky? Not a cloud. Then I looked at the park, there it was, 20 feet from me — a huge limb of an old tree crashed to the ground, leaves still shaking.

No one was down but the tree. Just today in the New York Times, Lisa Foderaro reported that the city is allocating more money for trees. This money for pruning cannot come soon enough. Like most New Yorkers, I live in the New York City parks. I don’t want to be scared of (or killed by) falling limbs.

I’m a tree hugger. And I don’t like the crash of a huge fallen branch.

(Just as I went to investigate, my bus pulled up so I snapped this pic as I rolled away.)