Chorus of trees

[dolorosa_12]

Today is another January talking meme prompt: forestofglory asked me to talk about a meaningful tree.

I love this prompt, but I struggled to narrow it down to just one tree! I grew up in houses with big gardens, and lots of trees, and schools in my home town are generally on huge blocks of land with giant, grassy playgrounds, so my childhood was surrounded by nature. Important trees encountered at this time included:

The magnolia and dogwood trees in our front garden, which my sister and I climbed constantly. The dogwood tree overlooking the nature strip was a particular favourite, as it gave us a good vantage point for what was going on in the street outside, and we used to sit in it, and log everyone walking past in a notebook (journalists' children gonna journalist).

The tree I used to use to climb up on the roof of the house, much to the horror of my parents.

The cluster of ornamental plum trees that grew near the play equipment at my primary school. These trees were a source of great interest to all the children at the school. For a while my friends and I had a game where we were migratory moons in the solar system, and the different trees were each designated as one of the planets, and we would drift among them, anthropomorphised celestial bodies, having adventures. Children at my school were forbidden to climb these trees — which of course simply increased their allure. The fruit that grew on them was, for some reason, considered especially desirable, and we used to surruptitiously climb the trees to pick the fruit, using younger children as lookouts. Given that only two teachers ever patrolled the vast school playground, we basically never got caught.

My maternal grandparents lived in a large suburban block of land in an area of Sydney that was surrounded by eucalyptus trees. One massive tree stood right in front of both the dining room, and the large outdoor terrace (which was often used for meals at large family celebrations), and my grandfather had built a platform for a bird-feeder. Huge flocks of sulfur-crested cockatoos, galahs, rosellas, lorikeets, and gang-gangs would drop by to feed on the birdseeds we left out, and my frequent childhood visits to their house were always accompanied by a cacophony of birdsong.

Every summer, for the week immediately before Christmas (which always encompassed my birthday), my family would spend a week in a holiday house at Broulee, on the south coast of New South Wales, along with another family, and at least one of my aunts. Broulee, for those of you unfamiliar with the place, has one large surf beach, and a smaller bay which backs onto the beach; these two strips of sand coverge at an 'island' which is actually a headland. Being sensible Australians, we never spent the hottest hours of the day outside, but would spend every morning (until about 10 or 11am) swimming in the bay, and every afternoon (after 3 or 4pm) swimming on the surf beach. At the end of the bay there was a wonderful tree, which I can visualise, but whose species I cannot name, under which we would set up camp, with sarongs and towels spread out in the sand, before diving into the water. One year the daughter of the other family had a broken leg in a cast, and couldn't swim, and her mother, an artist, spent every day at the beach with her painstakingly creating works of art from driftwood, woven with dry grass, empty shells, seeds, and so on. It was such an act of kindness, and really helped prevent this poor girl from feeling left out because she couldn't join the other children in the water that year. I still remember that tree, hanging over us all like an umbrella, a beacon we returned to every year.

We moved house when I was nine, into a place that sat on a veritable orchard: two apple trees, two pear trees, two plum trees, an apricot tree, a grapevine, and a kiwi fruit vine, plus two much loved Japanese maple trees. I spent every daylight hour at home sitting in these trees, writing in my diary.

There were other trees as I got older. The one that sticks in my mind most of all was the jacaranda tree in the main quadrangle at Sydney University, where I did my undergrad degree. Jacarandas flower in spring with vivid, purple blooms, and the tradition at the university was that when it flowered, this was a sign that you should begin studying for the second semester exams, which took place in November. Of course I, being both a very diligent student, and extremely neurotic, generally began studying long before that. Sadly, the original tree died in 2016 (ironically exactly ten years from when I would have last needed it as a signal to start studying), but it was replaced by a genetically identical clone. You can read all about it here.

Since moving to Cambridge, I've been fortunate enough to be surrounded by lots of marvellous trees, although none have quite the same resonance as the ones mentioned here. I post a lot of photos of them on my Instagram account when I'm out and about in the town.

Thanks for this prompt, forestofglory! I really enjoyed writing for it.

Comments

[forestofglory]

Thank you! This was lovely to read!

[dolorosa_12]

I'm glad you liked the post — I really enjoyed writing it!

[meteordust]

Just wanted to say what a lovely prompt this is, and how much I enjoyed reading your response. Jacarandas always remind me of springtime and exams too.

[dolorosa_12]

Thank you! This was one of my favourite prompts for the January meme — it was a lot of fun to write, so I'm glad you enjoyed reading it.

As I've moved to the northern hemisphere, I don't see jacarandas in person that often any more, but they'll always have that association for me, I think!