Venerable Elders, the World’s True Deities, or Hippy Hugger of Trees

March 10, 2014 2:16pm

I see in the trees knowledge. Many have been around a lot longer than me. Towering sequoias 3000 years old have known life existed before and far away from any thought of Christ. Groves of aspens, connected eternally through a single root system, have been around far longer than that. Even those with shorter lifespans have seen particular spots for decades, longer than any one human ever would have stood still in any given spot.

I see trees as travelers, too. They are the ultimate slow travelers, taking lifetimes to learn the intricacies of one hillside, one glen, and then moving along as fruit in the bellies animals or seeds of cones rolling down long hills, washed away by rivers to take root on distant lands.

Man has relied on trees since we first bloomed from apes, stole the for idem fruit, or were put here by aliens (depending on your particular beliefs). For fire, for food, lodging, the handles of tools, our very breath. Everything that sets man apart from beast, books, tools, weapons, all had their roots in the flesh of trees.

We ignore them, their being alive anyway. We see them as a resource, not a fellow inhabitant of earth. I try and see them as sacred, and I hold very little sacred in this modern world.

We’ve transformed them into particle board, replicated them with plastics, and mistreated them for our own profit. Still, they go on growing as best they can, supplying us with shade and oxygen.

The next time you carve your love’s name in a trunk, climb their limbs, or make a fire, try and take a moment to recall that they’re more than a decoration for your lawn, more than another yard full of leaves need takes.

They’re our history and our future.

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