Trees, Time and Kindnesses....

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:11

Oh, good, you're here. Let's talk lavender. Today we're going to talk about the way in which we shape our world and the way in which we shape our collective world. But we're going to start with a story. A story about an old man who planted a tree. He lived on the edge of town. His small house was the last one in a row of grey monotone box homes. And the front of his house looked out onto an open field on the other side of the street, which was wild with tufted grasses and small shrubs. In the summer it crackled out there with heat and harsh light that bounced off the haphazard rocks. In the winter it was soggy and waterlogged, but still worth dashing through as a shortcut from the bus stop at the end of town to the main street. Even if your jeans got soaked and your feet slipped in the mud. One morning the old man walked to the center of the field, holding a shovel hitched up on his left shoulder, and in his other hand he carried a burlap bag, swaddling a small oak tree, the rickety stem delicate and weaving like seagrass as he walked. He methodically dug a hole big enough for the root ball and gently placed the sapling, no taller than his hip, into the earth. He filled it in with soil and patted it down carefully. His neighbor from next door came out to watch, arms folded and head tilted to one side. You'll likely be dead before that tree gives any shade, he said. Probably, the old man said, and picked up his tools. He trudged back to his house, filled a pail with water from the faucet outside, and trudged back, gently soaking the sapling. He didn't stake the tree. He didn't put up a sign. He never made a statement. He planted the tree and left. Time passed. Children brushed past it with their backpacks. Dogs sniffed at it and moved on. A man on a bicycle clipped it once and made it whip sideways, but it returned to its upright position. Sometimes in the evenings when the air was thick and hot, the old man would trudge down with another bucket of water and pour it slowly around the little trunk. He'd stand there and watch it disappear, and then he'd go home. People would ask him Is that your tree? He would look at the thin trunk, the small leaves, its stubborn uprightness, and say it's a tree. Years passed. The oak thickened. Its shadow began as a narrow strip, fleeting, barely big enough for birds to cool their bobbing heads as they fluffed their feathers in the rising heat. But gradually its leafy canopy grew and widened into an actual patch of shade. It cooled the ground beneath it. Now and again a teenager would stop under it and stare at her phone, her head bowed over as her fingers flew over the glass like moths. A small boy sat there once, tapping stones and a crooked stick against the bare ground underneath. One afternoon, the neighbor was out watching the old man water it again with another scoop of water. It's coming along, he said. The old man nodded. I still don't understand why you bothered to plant it, the neighbor said. That summer the heat arrived early and stayed. Birds, insects, lizards, and the occasional human sought refuge under the cool tree. The old man watched from his yard, not with pride, not with the satisfaction of having been right, just with the calm demeanour of someone who had set something in motion and not tried to own it. His neighbor arrived one day, squinting toward the tree. They'll cut it down some day, he said. There'll be new sidewalks, new plans. They may build on that field. New housing. Maybe, the old man said. Likely you won't be here to stop them. The old man nodded, looking at the tree. Then someone will plant another. The tree swayed in the breeze as the old man closed his eyes, as if listening to something that had never needed his help. What if we plant something we will likely not enjoy the fruits of? I think we do it all the time. I think you do it all the time. Teaching a child how to count, how to read, how to draw a flower with a stem and six petals. How to be unafraid to ask questions. What about helping your new colleague through the maze of an unknown job? You are planting confidence and offering a hand up a ladder that for them reaches up through the rest of their life, wherever that may go. Donating a small amount of money or time to your community for something. Your high school, college, senior center, animal shelter, library. It all adds up. And more animals are helped and healed. More shy, frightened, or neglected children find refuge from the world in a library. A little extra money at school may pay for an early morning yard duty attendant to watch those kids on the swings whose parents have to drop them off at sunrise in order not to be late for a job far away. Your small acts of kindness, the ones you do every day, matter. You forget about them or you dismiss them. But I would like for you to remember some of them today. Because you did a good thing. And that good thing mattered. This reminds me of the nun I saw many years ago outside the dingy McDonald's in the sketchy part of my town. I was standing on the corner waiting for the traffic light to change and for the walk signal to start beeping. When, next to me, a tiny nun, dressed in her habit, walked right up to the jumble of homeless and desperately high people lying and leaning on the corner near the trash can full of greasy wrappers. I remember looking at her incredulously, taking in her black habit, the veil over her hair, right down to her woolen tights and little black flats. She seemed so small and vulnerable. She scooted around a large man with vacant eyes, and standing in front of a much older man, pressed a fistful of dollar bills into his chest. He backed away as if he'd been punched in the chest, not comprehending. The people around him made sounds of surprise, and a sharp woman's voice said, Take it, Dan, take the money. The nun looked at him in his face, really looked at him, and the kindness in her face made my chest tighten. It almost felt like grief. The homeless people started jostling and poking at the older man. He snatched the money and ran. The little nun stepped back, and a man with a raspy voice laughed at her, shaking his head at the folly of it all. You know he's just gonna buy beer with that money, he said. She didn't hear him. She straightened her habit, glanced at the little green man flashing on the other side of the crossing, and stepped into the street. I walked behind her all the way across the four lanes of traffic to the other side. I've never forgotten her and her deep compassion, and now you have heard of her, and of her throwing a pebble into a pond, which rippled out into the universe, filling hearts with gratitude for the kindness of some humans, which lifts us all up a little. I guess one just never knows what can happen when you decide one day to just plant a tree. All right, love.