Rooted in Time

Roots below, branches above; connected, making contact. The trunk acts as the bridge between the two, while its rings measure time.

@Ali Anani has been asking, encouraging and teaching us to look at patterns in nature generally and look at trees specifically to see how it all fits and comes together. As we are part of nature, he has us look at how we engage (or not) with our environment and how this engagement is influenced by nature’s process; how we live our lives personally and professionally, our choices, decisions and outcomes.

As I continue to take in his work and the dynamic discussions his work generates, I thought of the title of his Buzz, Patterns Are the Mirrors of Future. The tree’s internal rings (which cannot be seen from the outside) mark the passage of time. It is through this pattern that the tree communicates part of its story. We can decipher the number of years. Can we learn to decipher the “quality” of the years by looking at each ring and the space and patterns in between each ring? Maybe earlier patterns in the rings were predicting the tree’s future.

My personal ode to the trees.

I stand beside you and see your branches stretched out above while I can only partially see your roots which spread out below.

I sit by you and lean against the strength of your trunk. I allow the vibrations of the flow of life moving through you between your roots and your branches to touch my spine and flow in the same manner between my feet and my head.

I move among you. You stand still in order for me to make sense of my movements. To better understand where I am, where I have been and even allowing me the potential to see where I am going.