What the Trees SeeI was asked to ponder, “What has the ol...
What the Trees See
I was asked to ponder, “What has the oldest tree on your street seen?” Perhaps the intention of the question was to invite me to dwell on local history, which I did for some time. I discovered that the oldest trees on the street would all be around the same age, which, at most would be around 70 years old. It’s difficult to be certain without more digging into the construction history of Canberra, but it would seem that this part of Canberra was constructed after the two World Wars. Canberra was a fairly slow moving construction project due to a combination of interruptions, like those pesky wars, and maybe a national apathy and some shared spite from the two capital wannabe’s; Sydney and Melbourne.
As much as I actually enjoyed reading some of the history of this bowl I live in, a thought kept nagging at me, a problem with the nature of the task; trees don’t see.
I’m picturing the determined picks and shovels of sunburnt workers tearing up the dusty soil to build this street. The selected saplings are shoved into place and watered. The plants can't see. They don’t have a way to convert the sunlight hitting their leaves into an image. And then, even if they could, those trees have no mechanism for converting this impression of their surroundings into a memory in order to compare it to other previous memories and arrive at cognition.
Even if each vegetable was communicating with others via the network of their roots and perhaps some interplay with the vast sprawl of mycelium in the soil, what would they say?
“It’s still dry.”
“I’m dropping more leaves today.”
“A lot of birds have been chewing on me, but it’s ok because they have also been crapping in my drip zone.”
These are boutique trees. Spoilt Canberra stock, planted and are cared for. They have ‘seen’ the weather and some chemical alterations in the soil. They were ignorant of Summernats and showed little care for the numerous ceremonies in the last half century outside the war memorial. All the tearing down of first generation housing that is happening even at this very moment means nothing to these trees.
I like these trees. They house the magpies. And the magpies see everyone.(picture incoming...)
I was asked to ponder, “What has the oldest tree on your street seen?” Perhaps the intention of the question was to invite me to dwell on local history, which I did for some time. I discovered that the oldest trees on the street would all be around the same age, which, at most would be around 70 years old. It’s difficult to be certain without more digging into the construction history of Canberra, but it would seem that this part of Canberra was constructed after the two World Wars. Canberra was a fairly slow moving construction project due to a combination of interruptions, like those pesky wars, and maybe a national apathy and some shared spite from the two capital wannabe’s; Sydney and Melbourne.
As much as I actually enjoyed reading some of the history of this bowl I live in, a thought kept nagging at me, a problem with the nature of the task; trees don’t see.
I’m picturing the determined picks and shovels of sunburnt workers tearing up the dusty soil to build this street. The selected saplings are shoved into place and watered. The plants can't see. They don’t have a way to convert the sunlight hitting their leaves into an image. And then, even if they could, those trees have no mechanism for converting this impression of their surroundings into a memory in order to compare it to other previous memories and arrive at cognition.
Even if each vegetable was communicating with others via the network of their roots and perhaps some interplay with the vast sprawl of mycelium in the soil, what would they say?
“It’s still dry.”
“I’m dropping more leaves today.”
“A lot of birds have been chewing on me, but it’s ok because they have also been crapping in my drip zone.”
These are boutique trees. Spoilt Canberra stock, planted and are cared for. They have ‘seen’ the weather and some chemical alterations in the soil. They were ignorant of Summernats and showed little care for the numerous ceremonies in the last half century outside the war memorial. All the tearing down of first generation housing that is happening even at this very moment means nothing to these trees.
I like these trees. They house the magpies. And the magpies see everyone.(picture incoming...)
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