Nursery Logs

While on a trip with four of my friends, I took a shuttle bus to a Vancouver, British Columbia park – Capilano, a rain forest. I got there early, before the masses. A solitary guide, Katy, stood by the entrance to a walk around a pond.

She led me around the little body of water, introducing me to its wonders: ferns, salmonberries, and a nursery log.

Fallen to the forest floor, the remains of a magnificent tree had become the breeding ground for future life. Look closely and you can see the beginnings of redwoods, and pines and ferns and salmonberries.

Wandering off to other parts of the park, I saw other nursery logs – reminders of the amazing cycles of life and death that surround us. All the time. And it’s all good. And still too sad.

 

Many of my dearest friends are dying. So many of them from some form of cancer. Others, from Parkinson’s or some insidious form of dementia. I guess we/they are old enough – whatever that means. But it still seems wrong, unjust, unfair and far too sad.

And not sad. It occurs to me that we are each an amalgam of all that we learn from each other, and from the places we visit. Each of us is a nursery log – sprouting the ideas, words, smiles, tears and laughter that others have shared. And each of us is richer for it. Each of us – in some way – perpetuates the lives of those we love. It’s just more fun when we can see their faces