Wednesday, January 02, 2008

Life Resilient

We have this little plant growing in a little hole between our garage floor and wall (pictured left). The floor is some type of marble and the wall is concrete, yet this plant found that little source of light and broke through the surface. I'm totally amazed by it every time I walk by it in the morning. The little seed that could, a show of how resilient life can be.

That little plant (we don't know what it is) reminded me of the Narra tree in front of my parent's house (pictured right). That tree was a project back when I was still in primary school. I think we were asked to bring different kinds of trees. Back then, it was still a sapling when I brought it to school. After we presented it in school, I brought it back home and forgot about it. No one really paid attention to it and it was not watered daily. One day, my mother came to visit, she noticed the tree. It was in an old tin can and most of the leaves had fallen off. The thing was sickly and looked dead. She took it home with her and planted it in an empty lot in front of her house. Amazingly, it recovered and after a couple of decades, it is huge and I would not be able to wrap my arms around it if I tried. It is a magnificent tree. A friend of my father who is reputed to have a third eye (e.g. paranormal sight) once came over to visit and paused in front of the tree. He told my father never to take it down as there are good spirits who live in the tree that watched over it and its surroundings, including their home. He said that this was one of the reasons why my parent's home has been safe in spite of the fact that their place is one of the oldest in the area and almost all of their neighbors houses have been burglarized.

Also, when the missus and I were driving along Pres. Quirino Avenue, we saw a tree that was planted in the partition that separated the north and south bound lanes of the traffic (pictured right). It must have gotten too big than what the partition could handle as it was cut down leaving only a stump. But growing from the stump was two fresh but thick green branches. It the middle of the Manila traffic where pollution was so bad that most of the other tree's branches had turned black this tree, that was cut down, is surviving and bursting with new life.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

happi nu year! happy blogging!

Anonymous said...

it puts the adage "when there's a will, there's a way" into hyperdrive, doesn't it? sometimes it's little things like these that make you marvel at how wonderful nature really is!

just having a look-see. got here via blogrush :-)

Black_Mamba said...

Hey Echu!!! Happy New Year to you too. I hope you shine with magnificence just like the little (Narra) tree you so fondly remember from your younger days. Cheers :)

Anonymous said...

Cool! I remember my shcooldays too when we have our tree planting in our school. Now the tree is so big that the kids can now play along those shades from the trees that we planted.. happy new Year Echu! Nice Blog!

Anonymous said...

thanks for the movie recommendation! i'll see if i can't find the dvd. i'm looking forward to several movies coming out this year. not that i'm not a fan of filipino movies, i do have my favorites. it's just that, well, pinoy movie storylines are so predictable and generally sucky that i am wary about forking over my hard-earned money to watch something that'll make me cringe in disgust. i know! i know! so unpatriotic huh?

janet said...

Hey Echu! :) I love this post. I didn't know that that tree in front of your parents' house had such a gorgeous history.

echu said...

Thanks everyone!

@Evie: Sure does! I've always been amazed by the natural world, must be all those Attenborough specials :)

@black mamba: I am expanding horizontally and maybe getting just as heavy as that Narra tree :P

@T&Q: It's amazing isn't it? Also a reminder that we're all getting old :P

@Janet: Always happy to see you around here! Mama tells this story all the time, I'm surprised you don't know the story. The Coach must know!