I'm writing in the shadow of the birch, hemlock and maples that line the northern shore of the lake we’ve gone to every summer for as long as I can remember.
My mom’s mom had a camp here, a little white cottage with a red tin roof nestled under the white pines that, even now, tower above me and seem to tickle the clouds. When I was 15 or so, Oma sent me out with a ladder and a broom and told me not to come back until I had swept the needles from the roof. It was sunny and hot, and the tin burned the soles of my feet, but my reward at the end was a dip in the icy lake, clear as a summer sky.
Oma passed away some years back, but we still go to the lake. We stay somewhere else now—a cabin so small you have to eat your meals at the farmhouse up the hill—but even today, the smell of damp pine needles drying in the sun takes me back to those glorious teenage summers.
My—"obsession” is too strong a word, “appreciation” somehow not strong enough—for trees took root in earnest much later. Devon and I were back in DC after our stint in Korea. We were walking through the National Arboretum one weekend (a really lovely place to visit), when I suddenly got the eerie feeling that I was hiking again in the hills above Gwangju—a sort of déjà vu of the landscape.
The path turned a bend and I realized why—we were walking through the park’s Asian Garden, shaded by the same red pine, gingko, Japanese maple and cherry trees that lined the streets and trails we had walked down in Korea.
I began paying closer attention to the trees around me—at the way the afternoon sun filtered through the white oaks behind our house, at the smell of the boxwoods as I walked to work down Massachusetts Ave, at the smooth muscularity of the beech trees lining—uh—Beach Drive in Rock Creek Park.
And I realized how many of my own memories were tangled up with trees. The willow tree I used to climb in middle school, swaying from its crown in the wind. The chestnut trees that lined the trails of the Parc de Saint Cloud that I would run along in high school. The two sycamore trees that Devon and I got married under.
And now Benin.
I don’t have a West African tree book yet (recommendations accepted!), so I don’t know the name of all of the trees below. But here are some of the trees that, long after we’ve left, we’ll remember defining the landscape, serving as landmarks, and shading us from the tropical sun in Cotonou:
Appropriately enough, we’re here because of trees—Devon’s project is dedicated to helping cashew farmers. This funky little tree is what cashew trees look like—this is a young one.
When we first sent Evie to daycare, they told us that they were located at the end of the road “under the mango tree.” This isn’t that mango tree, but it’s a really cool picture of a different one in the neighborhood, so I’m sharing with you.
Kellan and I would cross this street every day on his way to school. I don’t know what kind of tree that is on the left, but it’s enormous and absolutely magnificent in person.
This is a fan palm tree—they’re really cool. The leaves shoot up from the middle and as the tree grows, they fan out to the sides until they fall off. This photo was taken during the Harmattan—annual winds from the Sahara that smudge the sky with sand and dust.
I love this garden from up near Evie’s daycare—the bougainvillea tumbling over the wall and the giant royal palm (I think that’s what it is) framing everything on the right.
This oil palm is in our front yard and I love it. That big tuft right under the leaves spits out red nuts that Beninese press and use for cooking oil.
This is the neighborhood middle school, which is shaded by a number of lovely trees. Not sure what kind this one in the middle is though.
That tall tree in the back is my favorite in the entire neighborhood. I don’t know what kind it is, but I love how it seems to stop growing up and starts growing out.
No comments:
Post a Comment