Trees

The family down the street planted 30 pear trees. They line the drive, 15 trees on each side. When you stand at the road you can look down the tree-lined drive to the house at the end. When put in they towered at about four feet. That was four years ago. Today they top out, fully-grown, at nearly 30.

But not all of them.

The first year, and for most of the second, the white blossoms were lovely (we lived far enough away not to be inundated with piles of flowers on the porch and deck blown in by the wind. Every tree did its part to bloom; every one succeeded.

At that point, about year three, equanimity faltered.

Some continue, to this date, to bloom, green up, turn red in fall and then drop leaves during the winter. All have not fared so well along this horticulturally sound pathway.

Hit by lightning, one struggled for two years to recover. One side of the tree did recover, the other was left bare. This same tree was hit by lightning a second time, go figure, and fell over the driveway, making egress and entrance impossible. This time the trunk was cut down to about four feet, the bulk of the tree hauled away. I figured, "well, that's the end of that." But no, now there are new green sprouts growing from the base of the trunk. This tree is struggling to survive. You can see this tree in the photo, left center.

Five of the current trees are in full red splendor. Seven of them continue to be green and the remaining two have lost all their leaves but not in a healthy way (envision Charlie Brown's Christmas tree). I think they're really dead. Only a few of the trees are the same height although they were all uniform when planted.

Fifteen trees from the same stock, planted on the same day in the same soil. Remarkably different outcomes.

Kind of like people. No two can be expected to grow along the same pathway even those planted in the same soil. Some pathways of life are predictable and welcome and are markers of maturity. Yet people sometimes get hit by the proverbial lightning strike and try to recover but never do. Some look like they might but some unseen force, or lack of unseen force, derails them even after a good start. Some look like they are the right 'size' and all, but suddenly one realizes there never was real life.

My goodness, this blog was just about those darn trees. I didn't mean to make it about life - yet perhaps every thing is about life.

And that's what I think about it.