This is the first of a two-part column. Because trees not only require but deserve two parts of our attention.
Majestic. Beautiful. Larger than life. Strong. All-knowing. All-seeing. Reaching skyward. Extending downward. Life-providing. Life sustaining. Simple. Complex. Miraculous. Useful. Worthy. Alive.
Silent. Trees. Trees don’t fight traffic or scramble in the morning hoping not to be late to work. They don’t ever cross the street or engage in friendly gossip. They don’t cross the street because they don’t move (at least not on their own). They don’t gossip because they don’t talk.
If only trees could talk. Think of the stories they could tell. I lived in a small town for 20-plus years. My husband and I raised our children there. Our house was built in 1920 - as were many of the houses – because the entire town, or nearly so, was destroyed by the great fire of 1918.
It was a series of unfortunate events that started with a spark from a train that landed on grass and foliage near the tracks. It had been an extremely dry summer, making the land ripe for ignition. High winds and low humidity contributed to the perfect storm.
People fled. Many lost their lives. Even more lost their homes. But not every home was lost. For decades I thought the entire town burned down in 1918, but I recently learned a small few survived. Homeowners sprayed water on roofs in hopes of avoiding personal catastrophe.
And sometimes it worked - as it did in the case of 758 Lilac Street (not the real address.) Recently, someone posted on social media that they used to live at this address and it was one of a handful of homes that survived the Big Fire.
Imagine my surprise. This is my daughter’s current address. She confirmed the information. Her house was built in 1910 - pre-fire. That got me thinking. If walls could talk. If trees could talk. Think of the plethora of information they could pass on. What would they say?
The trees that built my daughter’s house - that continue to support it even 100 years after the great fire, started their lifetimes long, long before 1918. They started as seedlings likely in the mid-1800s, if not before.
In human terms they’ve witnessed roughly seven generations (give or take) of our own (so very) important lives. That means my daughter’s great, great, great, great grandparents could have planted the trees that serve as the backbone of her house.
If only they could talk. The tales they might tell. During the first part of their life, they sat around in the forest - observing bunnies and serving as refuge for squirrels. They saw owls pursue prey and sighed in reverence when a white-tailed deer nested and nestled under the cover of their branches. They looked upward, pursuing the sun, priding themselves on being at the top of the sun-chain: the first to see the sunrise and the last to view the sunset.
And then, one fateful day, a human came with the axe and the peaceful existence they’d known forever was no more. They may have thought life was over.
Because it was over, at least as they knew it at the time. But the universe had other plans for these trees. They had a life yet to live, a purpose yet to fulfill.
The human with the axe cut the strong, healthy trunks into boards, cut the boards to size and fashioned them into the frame of a house. When realizing this, the tree understood that life wasn’t over. It was just beginning.
It was a new start with a new perspective, providing opportunities to see the world in ways the tree never had imagined - before.
And in that, before became but a memory and the tree (now wooden boards) immersed itself in its new existence. A brand new life.
But what would that life be? What would it mean? What would it lead to?
Tree was about to find out. As can we - all of us - if we are open to new and unknown things. An event that appears to be life-ending could be a beginning, if we are only able to see it as such.
Jill Pertler is an award-winning syndicated columnist, published playwright and author. Don’t miss a slice; follow the Slices of Life page on Facebook.
