Friday morning I sat on my back deck and looked for places to plant a tree on our postage stamp lot in mid-town. Mowing takes our son all of 15 minutes – front and back – because trees, bedding and produce gardens dot the property. Grass is not our top producer of mulch. Leaves are.
We live with three large trees. Trees that tower over the house, and the house stands at three stories tall. Majestic specimens all: oak, maple and hackberry. Mature trees. Trees that knock our use of air conditioning back a bit. I have told my husband many times that when even one of these trees leaves us, I’m calling the movers.
In the last week, two different neighbors have cut down same-size trees. Big ones. Upon seeing their removal – even if watching tree removal after a storm actually, my chest got tight. My palms ached a bit and I beat back tears. I have yet to dig down too deep on these physical reactions to loss to understand myself. Maybe I don’t want to. All I know is that within 24 hours of the second loss I was sitting and looking at my yard, thinking about planting a tree. I felt we needed another. Not we the people in my house, but we the planet.
I guess I’m a tree hugger. Big trees are magic to me. I can remember lying under the huge oak at one of my childhood homes. If offered a wide and dense canopy. I would look up and I was protected by a big green tent. If I heard something overhead or wondered about the sky, I would have to get up and walk away from the tree to see anything at all. Hearing was possible; sight was not.
I have spent the years since I was a political consultant trying to beat back agressive or fevered tendencies in my words and actions. I like to think I’ve calmed a bit. But on the issue of trees, knee jerk reactions are clearly on the rise.
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