Growth Rings

The risk to our ancient woodlands has made me think about identity and growth.  There are forests in England that have existed since the last ice age.  They are mentioned in the Doomsday book so they can be accounted for on the great day of judgement.  Individual, trees have fallen, rotted, and become compost for new seedlings, yet corporately the woods have existed for millennia. 

Similarly, every cell our bodies has died and been replaced many times over. Hair, skin, nails, brain cells - all have endured their own minute deaths and been resurrected, replicated, renewed.  How can we be the same person we were ten, twenty or thirty years ago? On a physical level, personal identity resides in our DNA.  Psychologically speaking, we recognise ourselves through our memories and character. 

The rings of a tree document the years that have passed - the hard winters and warm summers, the floods and the droughts.  Our personalities display the characteristics that have been forged through the dark days and the light.  Often our greatest growth occurs during our darkest times. “Can we depend on ourselves during this time? Forget about it. It is precisely in rough waters, and when our resources are exhausted, that we cannot depend on ourselves. Growth occurs on the rim of risk. You risk failure, disappointment, loss. You gain growth. Occasionally, God has to nudge (okay, shove is more like it) us out of our comfort zones to enlarge our rings" (Carol O'Casey, Unwrapping Wonder: Finding Hope in the Gift of Nature)

The rings remind us that growth is slow, hard won, and needs to be sustained and valued.

 

The loss of an individual tree does not destroy the forest.  But concrete over the entire woodland for new housing and it is not only the environmental impact on other species that needs to be considered.  We lose the memory and the character of our countryside, a sense of identity with the landscape which can never be replaced.  Our forests are at the rim of risk.  They face destruction.  We need to push ourselves out of our comfort zone and enlarge our rings, if only by signing a petition. https://t.co/h61S7gORWG