The Story of a Tree (583 hits)
Category: Quotes & StoriesRating: 1.74 on 22 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Sarah Prejean <derivablezero.at.gmail.com> (View user info) at 2005-04-12 11:19:47 EDT
The live oak tree has always been a southern symbol of strength. They line the small streets in my town; their reclining branches create a canopy of speckled light over antiquated homes. I'm lucky to have seen one in my back yard for the past 18 years; I'm lucky to have one of my own.
I suppose that it may be a sin for me to have my own tree there. It should be on a large plot of land, where there is room for the spreading that happens as the tree matures. The wooden beauty may reach anywhere from sixty-five to eighty-five feet high, but its majesty is in its width. The crown of the tree is wide and spreads sometimes longer than the tree's height. The trunk is butressed and flared at the base. It creates a natural chair for little behinds to sit in on summer afternoons. In our small yard there's not much room for the roots to expand: the branches have knotted and twisted because they can not grow out as curved and smooth as they should. We are holding back this tree on our tiny plot of land.
The tree is only about 56 years old; my grandparents planted it on their wedding day. I'd have to estimate that the width is about six feet. It's height is thirty feet at the most. But the top of the tree, at it's widest point from branch end to branch end... that width is ninety-seven feet. The east side of the tree falls over our fenceline and the highest branches provide a good spying point for nosey children. The west side of the tree droops gracefully onto the lawn at its lowest point, and the slope of the lowest branch creates a hard, scratchy hammock that is much more comfortable than it sounds. The dark brown bark has turned red with age, thick with shallow furrows and roughly ridged. With practice, you can wedge your feet between the thick flakes and pull yourself up. Perfect handgrips are provided by the blocky texture that the bark adapts with age.
That tree was a haven in my youth. With four cousins, two brothers, two grandparents and one mom running around, I always needed a place to think by myself. At my bravest I was able to climb to the highest branch. It was twenty feet high. Clutching both sides of the branch between my knees and arms, I could pull myself up and up until I finally reached the small nook in the tree where there was enough room to lay down and be comfortable. I'd look up through the sparse branches and watch the clouds dancing slowly in the bright blue lake above my head. Sometimes I wished that they'd carry me away, and sometimes I just did the typical eight year old thing and argued with myself about what the cloud looked like. A donkey, a balloon, a rhinoceros? A million possibilities presented themselves in that big old tree. I always chose the last, with a disappointing yet reassuring reliability. I'd climb down when my grandmother would get ten feet up and warn me about breaking my neck. It never shocked me that she'd climb that high at over sixty years old. It was what grandmothers were supposed to do.
A few years later no one climbed up there to get me. The tree had grown a bit higher and so had my confidence. At the top of the tree I could see into the master bedroom of my house. Clouds weren't nearly as interesting as watching my grandmother fly about, sewing and yelling at my grandfather and feeding the cats: the things that old ladies do when they aren't climbing trees. My spying is how I found out about the dress she was making for my birthday. At eleven years old I wanted a house for my dolls and a puppy. I remember how my heart fell when I saw her put that dress in the little pink box. The dress was yellow, about mid-calf length, and had white frilly lace along the hem. The top of it was fitted for a little girl with ribbons on the sleeves. She put it in the box and I scrambled down the tree and ran right into the house. I think the tantrum I threw that day was probably the first time that I broke my grandmother's heart.
At fourteen years old I had my first kiss. Sitting in a branch only about seven feet up, I wrote a letter to the boy who stole my heart. He was fifteen and so much more sophisticated and experienced. I was in a perpetual state of awe when around him. I didn't know that writing letters wasn't what boys wanted from girls. When I did find out what boys wanted from girls, I cried. I climbed up the tree to the highest branch, and I cried. I looked down at the ground beneath me and waited for my grandmother to run out and yell for dinner. For the first time in my life, my grandfather showed up at the bottom of the oak.
"Get on down here, girl! You're gonna break your doggone neck!" I didn't say anything for a couple minutes. "I'm not playin' with ya!" I moved to the branch below my seat and slowly made my way down.
Gramma was sitting on the patio sipping a glass of lemonade and smirking at me. "Boys ain't nothin', child. They's gonna come and they's gonna go and you'll neva know the diff'rence." I smiled at her, choking on my own tongue, and went inside for dinner.
The tree and I--we're older now. It's not much taller than it was when I first pulled myself through its branches. I'm quite a bit bigger in comparison; though somehow I'm afraid to climb it. I'm afraid that if I climb it I'll turn into that little girl counting the clouds and naming their shapes; I'll transform into the mischievous tree climber spying on her grandmother. I fear that if I go up I won't have anyone to get me down.
For now, I stay close to my grandmother. I only visit the tree when I want a cigarette or a place to sit when it's too sunny out. It's not often that I leave the house, there's always something that needs to be done. I don't want to leave her side or climb that tree.
We sit on the patio now and watch the squirrels play in the branches. We laugh about how just ten years ago she could climb up those limbs.
Even though she can't climb it anymore, I feel that in her last years when the days are long and the nights are much harder than they ever were: If I can make an old lady laugh about something as plain as a tree--then climbing isn't necessary, anymore.
User Reviews
Submitted by Crystle (user info) at 2005-04-12 19:24:12 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
agreed
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Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2005-04-12 17:49:22 (#)
Ranking: 2
This is far too intelligent and empathetic for this site
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2005-04-12 17:49:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This is far too intelligent and empathetic for this site - please make up for by camwhoring some of yoar intarweb boobies, plz.
Submitted by bluegoddess (user info) at 2005-04-12 15:40:21 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by MrWillard (user info) at 2005-04-12 15:14:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
No Comment
Submitted by nrduncan (user info) at 2005-04-12 14:03:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Jeanneee (user info) at 2005-04-12 13:26:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Cool. I'm an admirer of your great-aunt.
Submitted by Professional_Peon (user info) at 2005-04-12 12:51:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Cute story
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2005-04-12 12:00:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
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Submitted by indoninja (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:46:47 (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by mbstateside (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:38:15 (#)
Ranking: 2
I can't believ I'm +2ing a story about a tree but it was well written and I shared your love of climbing trees as a child (well for me it was pretty much anything but I digress).
Oh one more thing. Climb the tree again. You'll feel a whole lot better about things
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Submitted by loki (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:58:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
this was clever
Submitted by BuckeyesTHEGAME (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:57:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Damn, what the hell...
User ID: 17,991
and it's actually GOOD!!
I'm in shock. Between this and the Red Sox raising their World Series Champions banner at Fenway yesterday, then going on to beat the Yankees 8-1, I'm convinced the world is ending very soon.
But fuck it, Go Sox! Bring about the end of days!! WOO!!
Submitted by indoninja (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:46:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by mbstateside (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:38:15 (#)
Ranking: 2
I can't believ I'm +2ing a story about a tree but it was well written and I shared your love of climbing trees as a child (well for me it was pretty much anything but I digress).
Oh one more thing. Climb the tree again. You'll feel a whole lot better about things
Submitted by hungovermondays (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:38:18 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
your an oak, meaning your are steadfast...not fat.
this kind of made me think about tree climbing and youth, thanks for that
Submitted by mbstateside (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:38:15 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I can't believ I'm +2ing a story about a tree but it was well written and I shared your love of climbing trees as a child (well for me it was pretty much anything but I digress).
Oh one more thing. Climb the tree again. You'll feel a whole lot better about things
Submitted by shitfuck (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:36:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by wanderingsharps (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:35:15 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
you have good form.....+2 for that,
but in my opinion, a zombie or two and
some chainsaw action would really add to the story....
Submitted by Jeanneee (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:31:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Hey aren't you that nun from Dead Man Walking?
Submitted by Adamdidit2u (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:26:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
http://hort.ifas.ufl.edu/trees/QUEVIRA.pdf
Just because you got the facts correct I'll +2 this. My first degree was in Landscape Architecture
Submitted by hungovermondays (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:25:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
your an oak sarah
Submitted by ruthless (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:25:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by knucklesnelson (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:22:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
+2 because I've always wanted to call someone a tree hugger.
Submitted by knucklesnelson (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:22:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
tree hugger
Submitted by Sassmasterr (user info) at 2005-04-12 11:21:43 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
this is the story of a -tree-
who cried a river and drowned the whole world
and while she looks so sad in photographs
i absolutely love her...when she smiles