Ahhh . . . Trees & Some Observations

copyright, 2008, Marsha Jorgensen

So many things we could say about trees. Some are older than we'll ever fathom. They have watched the world go by forever. Some are as young as today. They give us shade. They give us something to lean against, something to swing from and climb. They give us somewhere to hide when we want a secret smooch or a private tinkle on a hike. They take that nasty old carbon dioxide and change it into oxygen so we can breathe (like it was part of some elaborate plan when the earth was created!). They give us shelter at times, give birds shelter too, and possums somewhere to hang from their tails. They give bees a place to live (other than our chimneys) and make their sweet gooey treat we all love to eat. They give us other food with their nuts and yummy fruit too. They give us roots that sometime cause plumbing problems and gardening headaches, but we emulate those roots when we want to feel like we have a place in the world. We watch their leaves to confirm what season we wish it to be. They can give us wood to build and create with, and burn for heat or obsession with dancing flames, but we try not to use them for that much anymore. We are protective of them now, which is good. We hug them. We groom them. We water them.

And sometimes, we decorate them in all sorts of traditional and rebellious ways . . .



The one above is my neighbors fruit tree. I'm not sure what kind of fruit it produces cuz I've never seen it. This is more of a utilitarian decoration. The clothes and bags hanging from this tree protect the fruit from flies and birds - I'm not sure that is fair in the balance of nature.

This one is a shoe tree we passed by somewhere on Route 66 a few years ago. We, in fact, drove out of our way to see it. Now, I'm not sure of the purpose of the shoes in this case, but in L.A. hanging shoes from a telephone wire means that drugs are available nearby, I guess (we didn't know that at the time, just learned this interesting street-wise tidbit recently).



This one below is, of course, a . . . . can you guess?



a chair-ee tree! Aha! Get it, cherry, chairy, chair-ee tree. My favorite. This one we saw in Kansas just a couple of months ago, right next to the World's Largest Collection of the World's Smallest Replicas of the Worlds' Largest Things (sometime I'll fill you in on my obsession with seeing and experiencing the world's largest things).