Although I ‘enjoyed’ a Catholic upbringing, I don’t think a confession will make this go away: I have to confess that I am responsible for (probably) killing a tree. All of the branches of the tree at the centre of our faculty have been cut. Oral history wants that this has been done before and the tree survived, and more: it had never had so many branches before as after the cutting. But not any longer. Now it looks as bare as one of those trees in a zoo environment for monkeys (or a range of other mammals who tend to ‘abuse’ trees, or simply consume them). Every day I get to the office, I am confronted with the consequences of expressing my concern about the noises this tree made under the load of heavy rain and a mild autumn storm. I thought cutting off a couple of branches would have done the trick, but no: all of them had to go. To make things worse: the cutters were publicly enjoying themselves in the act of sacrilege. Also, people around the office came to me (watching the act and its result) to express their concerns that this rigorous approach seemed unnecessary, without knowing that I was the culprit. To some I would confess, to others I didn’t. Luckily after a week people resigned to the state of affairs, but I’m left with this feeling of guilt. A feeling that will last until spring, hoping the tree will have turned out alright again by then. If not …
P.S. Spring 2009. It’s a miracle, it’s still alive.
