My Love Affair With Trees
They follow me everywhere, and I love each one of them for reasons only they can understand
Trees are everywhere. I love each one of them in a unique way. In the way, only a parent loves each of their children differently — that is what my mother used to say when we asked her which one of us five kids she loved the best.
I can’t have a favorite tree because the moment I declare one of them my “absolute, most favorite one,” another sneaks into my life, catching me in the way you react when a forgotten word or name pops into your head: “Ah, yes! That’s it!” This is how I felt when I saw the tree in the image above. It’s hard to fully grasp the magic, the mystery, and even the magnitude of this ancient beacon from this poor photo, but trust me when I say it inspires awe.
Located in Portugal, the tree had been watching me since the very first moment my family and I came to this town looking for a new life nearly two years ago. We didn’t know we were being watched as we passed under the old city arch and entered the walking zone. It was a hot day for us, but just another 12 hours of brightness filled with rejuvenating sunlight for the tree. This tree has seen no less than 300 and maybe 400 years of such light and airy periods we call days. In our life, it was just a three-hour jaunt to the Northern city to check its soul. If we felt it, then we decided we would stay. The novelty of living in hotels and eating breakfast with strangers was getting old — and costly.
So there we were, winding our way up the small street, marveling at the fountain, the orange trees, the lemon trees, and the little park surrounded by, yes, fantastic trees. High above us, though, the tree revealed above was perched and watching intently. This tree is clearly the commanding one in this ancient town. Not far from the train station, a part of me thinks that it serves as a sentry for the town, determining who can enter, who must leave, and who can stay and inject new life while simultaneously extracting necessary energy from the town.
As a student and even a bit of an obsessed fan of history, my love for trees partially stems from the fact that I envy them. I envy how they stand off to the side and silently observe the world around them. As big and magnificent as they become, people standing near them, under them, in them even, tell their deepest and most cherished secrets with little regard that a tree is watching.
History unfolds around as if they didn’t exist. Like massive flies on the wall of life, trees are nowhere and everywhere all at once because they are the unnoticed visual white noise escorting us through life from birth until finally, beneath one or many, we are buried — and the trees, which might have been fully grown or saplings when our lives commenced, look down, drop some leaves as if crying, and then refresh themselves for another year — to watch more of the goings-on around them.
The Bonsai tree
I received a Bonsai tree for Christmas. As I spoke to it the other day, my son walked up and asked what I was doing. Peering through the leaves, I told him I was climbing the tree.
“How?”
“Just in my head.”
We sat and climbed it for a few minutes together. In reality, though, I was never a tree climber. I always feared that I would get stuck or fall, break something, and not be able to play baseball. Baseball was my priority.
Venturing into the world of a “bonsai tree owner,” I began to rekindle my love affair with trees. No, rekindling is wrong because the fire of this love is always in some form of burn: It ranges from quiet smoldering to raging inferno. The Bonsai tree merely opened the flue, letting in some more air to restart the flames.
My “special trees” are all over the world. There isn’t a country that I have visited except maybe China and Hong Kong (China was too smog-filled when I was there in Hong Kong, just really urban) where I haven’t stopped to communicate with a tree. It will usually begin with a photo. Then, I stand for a moment and try to imagine how the tree before me had passed through the years. If possible, if I know the history of that area, of that given spot, I create little movies in my head of how famous and not-so-famous people passed by that tree without ever taking even a second glance.
This photo was taken in Hyde Park last July. The crowd of 70,000 was waiting for Bruce to emerge. The stage was built around the tree! How many people took notice of this lucky tree with the best seat in the house? By the size of the trunk, this tree has been overseeing Hyde Park for centuries — war, famine, plague, kings, and queens have come and gone, and there it stood, proudly drunk in the energy of this crowd of Bruce fans.
I am sure many of you have favorite trees in your lives. When I return home to the U.S., I purposely go out of my way to say “hi” to my favorites. Two of them, on a country highway known as 537 between Freehold and Philadelphia, stand in a farmer’s field calling out for swings, carved initials, and a nice, unhurried picnic. Standing in the middle of the field, though, given our penchant for “private property,” the trees are off-limits. They stand there, waving to me as I pass by, year after year. They took notice of me well over 40 years ago, or vice versa. One day, I will get out there and drink a cold beer under them.
There are 17,000 photos on my phone, and at least 500 of them are of trees dating back to 2013. It’s a new year, and no fewer than another 50 slightly narcissistic trees will tap me on the shoulder with the polite but persistent request that I snap their photos. I will because I can’t not take their pictures.
I need them.
Sometimes, as I wander through my life, on the lookout for the next tree, I kid myself that they need me, also. Some do, I think. They need me to tell their story.
This is the same tree from the very first image. I can’t tell anyone where it is because if I did, I would be breaking the promise I gave to it. This tree is a bit shy but oh-so-elegant and needed in this world.
Go out today and talk to a tree. It will make all of your problems feel less pressing and some even comical.
Ahhh such a beautiful story trees have always been my best friends since childhood. I grew up on my Aunts nursery in Skippack PA my uncles family go all the way back to 1760 when t my uncles great grandparents brought to America the first pink dogwood and the praying mantis. Thomas Franklin Meehan from Germantown pA. There are tree stories that have come down through the generations things like trees do cry and do have a memory bank. My uncle would tell us stories about trees that they could remember everything and everyone that was ever around them. Think about that. They have had a tradition that when they die they choice a type of tree and after they are buried the tree is planted on top of them no grave stones . My parents were cremated yet we still planted a tree over their ashes, my husband and I plan to do the same and have oaks planted on us.