To Be as Resilient as a Tree

Two nights before it was due, I remembered my homework was to take myself on an art date.  After saying it out loud, my artist daughter came to life.  She already had a list of places I should go, and she was eager to take me.  After a day of work and a quick meal, I drove to meet her.  She directed me to an area with lovely houses and acres of green fields.  On this day, the fields were crowded with geese seeming to have their weekly meeting, or maybe it was church, or a family reunion.  At the edge of the fields lay a trail lined with trees.  It was early March.  In a month, these trees will be clothed in their green glory, but on this day, they were skeletons of themselves.  Somehow, they still maintained a unique beauty and life, drawing me to them.

We parked and started working our way down the trail.  The first tree, sitting along the dirt road, appeared as though it had survived a battle.  Its trunk, the size of 3 trees, not including the large shorn off section lying next to it, bade me to stop. The rip could only have been made by something as powerful as lightning.  A 50-foot long log lay on the ground, separated from this mangled tree. Today, it had a life of its own.  It added its soul to the soil and provided living space for insects, fungi and small animals.  The standing tree was the remains of one who has been in a great battle.  Long, strong branches, havens for climbers, broke suddenly as though Vecna had been there performing his magic.  In every direction this tree reached towards the sky and its sturdy branches suddenly changed directions.  This tree, appearing to sustain attacks on all fronts, still stood.  

Every step along our hike was decorated with more trees, large and small, refusing to be taken down.  New growth took over where branches broke.  Split trunks, surrounded by the remainder of the tree growing around that shattered space.  One tree lost part of its trunk.  What remained held the twisted wood that had once been a knot.  A tiny twig protruded out of it, a rebel that was determined to keep growing.  Trees, branches, twigs crossed every space surrounding our trail.  It was a wooden representation of a laser field.  I would have missed the mangled scene if the trees held their leaves.  I would have missed the skeletons that held each of these bushes together.   

Then there were the roots.  I imagined with each year, with each rainstorm, and with each gust of wind, these trees grip the ground with their roots.  They feel a gust from the east, they dig in.  The water threatens to take them down, they spread their roots deeper.  The largest trees stood because they had the strongest roots.  I imagined any scenario where you feel you might fall: ladder, cliff, back of a motorcycle, and you grip with all your might.  These trees don’t just grip, they extend.  They extend their roots any direction they need to, any direction they want, so they don’t fall.  Some roots didn’t hold, those trunks rested on the ground.  I understand why fantasy tales bring trees to life.  They walk and talk as Ents in The Lord of the Rings series.  They create a treacherous forest in Princess Bride.  They are old, resilient, and mysterious.  Their existence creates a fantasy world.

Even the fallen trees are resilient.  They lay on the ground or lean on other branches, refusing to decompose quickly.  Their bark is soft and smooth or gone completely.  The openings are now doorways to coveted homes for all types of creatures.  These decomposing trees have not stopped giving.  They can no longer reach to the sky in grandeur, growing with the seasons to provide nests for the birds.  Instead, they settle on the ground, resting, and helping.  Where the tree touches soil, it gives of itself.  It allows the decomposers to break and consume it.  We get to be a part of this tree’s slow death.  One day, it will be a part of the earth again.  The tree does not stop giving.

I see the broken tree.  I see the decomposing tree.  They both are giving all they can.  Even in death, the trees do not stop giving.  Even when their branches are cracked, broken, and their trunk is in pieces, they continue to grow and give to other living things.  Trees don’t quit under hardships.  They don’t pull up their roots and give in.  They don’t grieve their broken parts.  They stand.  When they can no longer stand, they give of themselves.  They say, “Fuck you, I’m growing anyway.”

Oh, to be a tree.  What if we keep standing and growing after we have been broken?  What if we dig our roots in deeper when the trials come to take us down?  What if we give life to the small things when our feet have been taken from us?  Each tree keeps existing to the best of its ability.  Each tree contributes to the forest.  Even the roots become the walls of a dirt home to the animal who dug holes deep into the ground.  I can see their dirt home.  It is dark and soft.  They know the walls are steady because they are made of the roots of a tree.  No one will take out those roots.

What can I learn from the resilience of trees?  What can I learn about how to continue to stand when the days are difficult?  What can I learn about beauty that persists after parts are broken?  These trees bring me hope.  They bring forth awe.  All that I have observed about their strength is only the tip of the iceberg of nature.  Yet, all that I observe could fill volumes.  

Thank you for these trees.  Thank you for this example of resilience sitting by the water, standing steady despite the onslaught of people, nature, and time.