My Beloved Tree Has Fallen

To be more accurate, it was taken down by the forest service because it was dying for some time. This is the Ponderosa Pine that some of us friends in the mountains estimate to be somewhere between 200 to 300 years old. It was probably 40~50 feet tall. More than 6-foot in diameter at the bottom. I’ve been visiting this tree as long as we’ve had our mountain house for the last 14 years. I’d often talk to it and ask for help. It was just comforting to look up at this tree and know it’s been standing there way, way, way before this area was developed into a little mountain community for us humans. It’s awe-inspiring to know it must have seen all the changes in climate, vegetations around as well.

A few years ago after a several years of drought in California, we noticed the needles were turning brown. I don’t know for sure if the drought was the cause for it. It may well be that it was simply time for this giant tree to yield to the young and upcoming trees that are growing around it. As I learned in the topic of “wood wide web,” these trees do favor their own offspring to send the nutrients via their roots.

When my friend, Peter, sent me a message that the forest service crew was working in the woods to take down the dead trees and he heard a thunderous thump of our tree falling, I was actually in my hotel room in Japan and cried. That tree was a huge presence in “my forest.” Although that particular notification from Peter was actually a false alarm, it was within the few weeks since that they did cut it down. Sad, yet it is just another reminder about impermanence. Even a big seemingly invincible tree like that has an end. And so it is…