ABOUT THAT TREE
As with everyone who has seen the recent story of the felling of the iconic old Sycamore on Hadrians Wall, I felt sad and a little bit incredulous how anyone could even go there!? It appears now that a 16yr old has been brought in for questioning about it and actually, now it makes sense.
The chances are they might just be an arrogant little fucker on an arboriculture course who just won a dare with their mates OR, they might have just single-handedly created the most concentrated, laser-focused call to environmental arms in the UK so far. They could be a genius!
Remember then? Remove all the layers of cynicism you’ve built around yourself as an adult that you sink into for protection, expose that sixteen year old layer. How easily we wounded, how easily we could be riled by passion, the need to ACT, those sleepless nights fighting the urge to smash shit up, kick things down, burn stuff, run the fuck away and change the world. ..
Imagine being 16 now. You’re full of the rage of youth and you’ve grown up, literally, your entire life under the suffocating fog of CLIMATE EMERGENCY. Every summer of your existence you’ve watched the world burning, flooding melting starving, moving running crying protesting, all in surround sound super-colour fully immersive, eye-witness on-the-ground live stream 24/7. But you can’t do anything about it because you can’t vote and your curfew is home by 10pm on a school night because you’re expected to concentrate on your future.. YOUR WHAT NOW!?… those you see with any power are doing worse than nothing! Actually reversing environmental policies and targets that were set!
Now take an iconic tree. A lone sentient with all it’s symbolic power. The old Lores; protector, warder of evil, symbol of strength and unity, the very tree of life in Yggdrasil connector of worlds and its new symbolism appearing on the big screen and in a million instagram posts. Surely a worthy sacrifice for the cause. Cut down while a storm rages. The metaphors are too cliché!
I’m glad that a sixteen year old cut the tree down. I hope its wood is whittled into ten million sticks to arm every teenager in Britain who has watched their entire lives and future’s be wilfully ignored so that they might beat every single policy maker, backer and funder into the dirt. Finally then, the kids might feel they have a valid purpose on this planet and progressive things might actually get done.
Image from BBC News Web.
