Heroes Not Zombies

A tree we might say is not so much a thing as a rhythm of exchange, or perhaps a centre of organisational forces. Transpiration induces the upward flow of water and dissolved materials, facilitating an inflow from the soil. If we were aware of this rather than the appearance of a tree-form, we might regard the tree as a centre of a force-field to which water is drawn….The object to which we attach significance is the configuration of the forces necessary to being a tree….rigid attention to boundaries can obscure the act of being itself.

Neil Evernden, in ‘The Natural Alien’

I don’t know how this particular tree came to grow this way, but when I saw it I was struck by how the form revealed the process….not only did it reveal the flowing, developing nature of the tree, but it presented a permanent memory of an event. One day something happened in this tree’s life and it took a turn to the left, a sharp turn. It looks like it was a pretty dramatic event, maybe even one of those events which could bring its life to an end, but it didn’t…..it survived, and coped, and flowed in a new direction.