I was born a tree-hugger, loving nature and gardens before I was old enough to understand their importance to the earth.  I could say coreopsis before I could say Sesame Street. The women in my family grow things.  Gardening is part of being a lady in the South.  Weezer from the movie Steel Magnolia’s said it best. “I am an old Southern woman.  It is my obligation to wear funny hats and grow tomatoes.” The truth in this is uncanny.  Flowers and bushes get planted everywhere.  By April, almost every yard has a tilled up garden spot to grow fresh vegetables.

Southern lands are green and fertile, and loving nature would seem like a natural thing to Southerners. We do have an amazing variety of flora and fauna. Yet, they blatantly disregard the importance of trees. I have long been given to serious heart palpitations when I pass yet another patch of land that has been unnecessarily cleared of its trees.  When I was younger, I was naïve enough to believe that people would only cut down woodlands in the South if they were desperate for money to survive.  As I got older, I began to notice that this was not always the case.  Sometimes people like to tear things down to show the power they have over whatever they have destroyed. There seems to be something disrespectful inside of people that make them want to remove something that has lived twice as long as they ever will.

 

Apparently, trees are just large obstacles that are in the way. Are people unaware of true magnificence or are they simply ignorant that trees take in CO2 and in turn release Oxygen, the chemical element humans, even Southerners, need to breathe?  I don’t know.  I sadly believe that it comes down to a lack of caring.

Outside the window of a place I frequent most days, stands the largest magnolia tree that I have ever seen.  Actually, there is an all around agreement that it is the largest that anyone from my small patch of the world has ever seen.  This tree is old and regal.  When it blooms, the blossoms are larger than my head.  This tree is so spectacular that people should stop instantly in their tracks to appreciate something that has stood through time.  Yet, it’s rare that anyone notices it, and when they do, the most common comments made are atrocious.

“I don’t know why anyone would plant a tree there.  Someone should pull that tree up.  Its roots are beginning to crack the sidewalk.”  Seriously!?!  I am afraid to admit, that I was unable to find the humor in this comment, and simply had to reply in return.  “Bless your heart. You can’t seriously believe that someone planted a 200 year old tree beside that nice new sidewalk…”  Where is the moron who made the decision to put a sidewalk two feet away from a tree?

I actually overheard someone say aloud as they peered out a Court House window,  “If they removed this big ole  tree (that’s been regally gracing the building for 200+plus years with its natural splendor), then THIS would be a great view.””  

 

Why is this typically Southern funny?  Brace yourself for the answer.  This is how it was explained to me.  Because, they revealed,  this verdant and flourishing green gift of nature “is blocking us from seeing the “old jail house”, “People will come from miles around to look at that spectacular view.”

Naturally, the decaying ugliness of the stoic jail is much more desired than respecting the historical glory of a tree which has seen over 2 centuries of comings and goings of the townspeople, provided shelter for small birds and animals, and has emitted much-needed clean oxygen at the site of the town square, which is populated by choking auto emissions.  

Right? This person really believed that to destroy something “old”, by removing the resplendent leafy-green vista which softly conceals the beauty that is the old nasty jail house would be a good thing. It’s another sad case of something new to replace the old, because some soul doesn’t value life, history or nature. 

The Southern view of nature is a dichotomy.  I cannot think of a single house that is not gardening in some way.  Yet, no one blinks an eye when yet another tree is destroyed.  I will not lose hope though.  I will share my tree appreciation for whoever will listen, and hopefully, that joy will spread!