Sunday, 24 August 2008
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The Tree
In my yard are several trees. Pine, three kinds of oaks, two kinds of maple, and a few other various kinds. I am glad for all of them for they bring enjoyment and they bring great lessons. I have seen trees that try to dominate other trees by spreading their branches over the smaller trees and blocking the sun from them, and I have seen trees that humbly wait and absorb reflected light.
One maple, although not particularly a beautiful tree, has revealed to me some special secrets to encouraging and helping others. This tree was bought and placed into a hole in the ground by my driveway. It was barely four feet tall. My feelings weren’t for what it was, but for what I hoped it would be. It had one branch that kind of turned down at an awkward angle, but I knew it would grow. But it was very slow to grow. The oak across from it also got a slow start, but then it just seemed to take off on its own.
Maples, at least my maples, are slow to shoot out the leaves in the spring, and then at the first signs of cooling temperatures in the fall they begin to change and then drop their leaves. That means that their growth season is a little shorter than other trees.
And then there was the winter that it was hit by a snow plow; scraped up the side of its trunk, a gaping wound. I had to spray the cut each spring for five or six years until it healed back. Bugs and bacteria just seem to love an open wound. Trunk wounds mean that there is a decrease in the amount of growth that is possible as well, but over the six years the tree continued in its slow growth and finally reached about eight feet in height. I trimmed the tree and even anchored it for a while to help it grow straight.
Now the tree is about fifteen feet tall and it is filling out rather nicely. It isn’t majestic like an oak, but it is doing its part to shade the yard. Some day it may be thirty or forty feet tall, but that will just be a part of the plan.
To be continued . . .
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