The One Old Apple Tree: A Love Story

I just wrote this long, sad message to some girlfriends of mine. I share it here as I sent it. If anyone reads this please add your answers/suggestions to my last question.

Woke up to devastating happens around our property. We've had a mild winter in the Finger Lakes but last night we had rain then wet snow that knocked out power (that meant no hot water to bathe, ugh.) AND snapped tree limbs and trees. Here's a little tally of what I found as a walked around our little place in the countryside.
Forsythia: Crushed. It was huge and a beautiful screen between our propane tank and the rest of the yard.

Red Bud Tree: Limbs snapped. Blossoms had just started opening. It was lovely.

Blueberry Bush: Buried and Crushed. My Sweetie had just planted it last week, we plan to get more, but, so sad to see.

My lettuce, cabbage arugula transplants into hoop house: Buried and Gone! :( They were super tiny little seedlings but we had been having such perfect Spring cool weather, I put them out last week.

Peas: Not yet sprouted but now Buried under 4" of wet snow. I direct planted these just outside our bedroom window to create an edible, green trellis as they grew.

My Hoop House: Half Crushed, Some Seeds Buried. It's little only about 15 ft. long, 4 ft. high, 5 hoops. I'd finally turned the clover cover crop, dug out some little planting spaces and transplanted the lettuce, etc. seedlings and cover with plastic 2 weekends ago. Ive left the transplants uncovered and only the last 'bay' was covered. Under it I'd direct seeded Detroit Red beets and brussel sprouts. Keeping that part was making a nice constant wet area for the seeds to sprout. Now the hoops are broken at their support line and the seeds are buried the plastic which is covered in 2" of heavy (I tried to lift it), wet snow.

I've saved the WORST for last. THE APPLE TREE: UPROOTED. BLOSSOMS FROZEN. IT'S DONE FOR. Now, ladies, Prop. Me. Up. Our house is shabby. It's what he could afford with me unemployed over a year. It has great potential and 4 acres, mostly trees. One of these trees is next to the garage. An Old apple tree. When we moved in last Autumn it had already been bearing fruit for a while so we only got a few. Couldn't figure out what variety it is.

Gurrrls, they were DELICIOUS! I don't mean the variety you can get in every store in any city across the country. I mean, JUICY, NOT TOO SWEET, PERFECT FOR PIE, HOMEMADE APPLE SAUCE, OR STRAIGHT. OFF. THE. TREE.

Schatzi trimmed back some of the dead limbs, raked up all the leaves underneath (which were lovingly added to my growing compost pile). Just yesterday when it was only raining I thought to myself, "Self, that soil must be rich by now. That would be a lovely, protected place to try growing some more lettuces and peas under that beautiful, just starting to bloom Old Apple Tree." I was going to do it today. And now it's gone.

We were so looking forward to those apples this year. After all, this was our first year in the house. We only had The. One. Old. Apple. Tree. The snow was so wet & heavy that it bowed the branches full of beautiful, new blossoms to the ground. I imagine the whole tree held on so strongly until it couldn't any longer and the big main root literally snapped and heaved out of the ground and the tree, intact toppled over.

I must mourn it.

Then I must honor her by do good things with that apple tree wood. What shall I cook, smoke, dry with it's fire and smoke? Any suggestions?