#6: Overthrown

Haunted by the ghosts of trees.

I Conquered (2022) Digital drawing.

An enormous oak tree once sat on the edge of my friend’s new property and was gone long before she moved in. The oak met its untimely demise after one of it branches grew defiantly over the neighbor’s garage. Their fear of property damage was the catalyst for the former owner of my friend’s house to just say ‘fuck it’ and take the whole tree down to the ground. Leaving behind a seven foot wide stump, enough sun to fry every plant once shaded by its mass and a doubled electric bill. But at least the garage is safe.

I don’t know why I’ve become obsessed with a tree I’ve never personally seen.

A Tired Swing (2022) Digital Drawing

Maybe it’s because the maple that stood in the backyard of my childhood home is no longer standing either. A place where we spent hours staring up into it’s branches as we spun wildly underneath on our tire swing.

Neither is the evergreen that towered over us as we built forts under its branches. Popping out to shoot college students with our air rifle as they walked past. They always acted surprised but it was obvious we were there giggling.

The catalpa that stood outside our apartment window is also gone now. Its heavily flowered branches collapsed to the ground in front of our eyes the summer before the pandemic. All that’s left is open sky and our living room feeling like a stage.  I miss that tree every single day.

I don’t know, maybe I’m getting old. I see my own life marked by the trees as I walk the same route with the dogs. Watching their leaves change season after season and their trunks thicken year over year. I recognize their ghosts after they fall and then get replaced by plastic and capital.

I know a new tree will find its way into the soil filling the void of that once majestic oak but I find myself asking what future will be left for it to grow? Who knows, maybe this next one will make it to a hundred.

Pined For (2022) Digital Drawing