My sister asked me a random question along this subject: "What would it be like to be a tree?" As I drove across Wyoming and looked at the scraggly stumps that pass for trees, I came up with a few topics that give me pause to reflect and respect trees.
Trees withstand loneliness and solitude. In some of the most inhospitable conditions, trees manage to eek out a living, growing larger year after year and betimes even reproducing. Many trees grow in places they shouldn't, like one growing in a tributary river near Jenny Lake in the Tetons that had grown in the middle of the river, wrapped around a large boulder. Sometimes they seem to defy gravity, erosion, and the weather. They stand in the middle of nowhere, while winds whip around them, still pointed largely upward due to geotrophism. Trees stand strong. Years ago, I heard this excerpt from a poem: Good timber does not grow in ease/ The stronger the gale the tougher the trees.
From that image, I move to how trees demonstrate fortitude and a stalwart nature. When the going gets tough for people, we pack up and move. Trees like all plants must face their troubles. Sometimes, when we take a stand against powerful forces of opposition, we stand alone like trees, but if we stay straight against those winds of opposition, others marvel at our steadfast resistance. Trees don't give up easily. Neither should we.
Finally, trees come with a promise of fruit, of expanse, of the good things in life that come from staying true to our nature. It is the business of all living things to multiply and replenish themselves, passing on what is good in them and providing good forage for other life forms around us who can taste of our fruits and be nourished thereby. How welcome a sight might have been an apple tree, however bedraggled it may have appeared, to the weary pioneers coming across the Oregon Trail!
If I were a tree, I'd hope to be of the type I saw on the plains of Wyoming- tried and true.
Trees withstand loneliness and solitude. In some of the most inhospitable conditions, trees manage to eek out a living, growing larger year after year and betimes even reproducing. Many trees grow in places they shouldn't, like one growing in a tributary river near Jenny Lake in the Tetons that had grown in the middle of the river, wrapped around a large boulder. Sometimes they seem to defy gravity, erosion, and the weather. They stand in the middle of nowhere, while winds whip around them, still pointed largely upward due to geotrophism. Trees stand strong. Years ago, I heard this excerpt from a poem: Good timber does not grow in ease/ The stronger the gale the tougher the trees.
From that image, I move to how trees demonstrate fortitude and a stalwart nature. When the going gets tough for people, we pack up and move. Trees like all plants must face their troubles. Sometimes, when we take a stand against powerful forces of opposition, we stand alone like trees, but if we stay straight against those winds of opposition, others marvel at our steadfast resistance. Trees don't give up easily. Neither should we.
Finally, trees come with a promise of fruit, of expanse, of the good things in life that come from staying true to our nature. It is the business of all living things to multiply and replenish themselves, passing on what is good in them and providing good forage for other life forms around us who can taste of our fruits and be nourished thereby. How welcome a sight might have been an apple tree, however bedraggled it may have appeared, to the weary pioneers coming across the Oregon Trail!
If I were a tree, I'd hope to be of the type I saw on the plains of Wyoming- tried and true.
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