One item I like to retweet on Twitter (for those unfamiliar with Twitter, this is when you take someone else’s Twitter post and send it to the people who follow your account) is nature regenerating against the odds. Two or three years ago, I found a picture of a fir tree growing on a boulder in the middle of a glass-like lake. Somehow a seed dug its way into the rock, spread its wings, jammed its roots deeply in, germinated and grew until its limbs expanded in prayer.
I appreciated the solitary beauty of the photograph and retweeted it to my followers. The results were staggering. Neither before nor since have I posted an item that garnered the number of retweets or “favorites” (similar to “likes” on Facebook) on any photo from my Twitter page. That retweet exceeded the nearest competitor by probably a margin of 10.
It wasn’t just about the beauty of the photo. Instead, I believe it was about the symbolism. Somehow, against the odds, nature survived. It thrived in tough surroundings. That speaks to our human condition. We appreciate the underdog; we love to see the little guy going up against the giants and winning. And we also want to see the splendor of nature make it in our increasingly man-made and technological environment.
This past week, our area of North Texas got hit with seven inches of rain over a three-day period after almost four straight months (close to five, actually) of nearly not a drop of precipitation. During that time, the two tomato plants and one banana pepper plant I had in our garden died. I watered for awhile, trying to keep them alive in the blistering, brain-fatiguing heat and sun, but they browned up and keeled over.
A second banana pepper plant stayed alive for some reason. Even more strange, I chose not to yank it out and toss it into our compost pile. Instead, because it wilted, but didn’t fully expire, I left it in the soil. The leaves still maintained some greenery. They drooped. The stem tilted and wilted. But it hung on.
Then the deluge hit, and like magic, the plant righted itself, greened up, and grew. I remarked on this to my wife – how close I’d been to yanking it out, and how remarkable it was that the plant could get beat up day after day by the heat and sun and cling to life, then suddenly be uplifted by three-day downpours.
Many years ago, I had the opportunity to visit Australia, and head to the outback, where Ayers Rock sits. It’s a huge sandstone in the middle of desert-like conditions, with nothing around except scrub for as far as you can see. Millions of years ago, that part of the country was under the ocean. Today it gets (if my fuzzy memory serves me adequately) about two week’s worth of rain during a short period of time.
As I climbed the rock, there were tiny indentations in the rock, perhaps big enough for you to insert the tip of your thumb. Inside there was water. In that water, I saw tadpole-like creatures swimming.
This made me wonder what type of amphibian could survive without rain for 50 weeks out of the year, go into hibernation, then reproduce in two weeks when it did rain. Nature won. It survived.
The solitary tree, banana pepper and tiny tadpole all defy the odds and demonstrate how nature restores itself. As we batter away against the natural world with high technology, tools and weapons, it remains a wonder to see nature making a statement, telling us, “I can stand up against all odds.”
I appreciated the solitary beauty of the photograph and retweeted it to my followers. The results were staggering. Neither before nor since have I posted an item that garnered the number of retweets or “favorites” (similar to “likes” on Facebook) on any photo from my Twitter page. That retweet exceeded the nearest competitor by probably a margin of 10.
It wasn’t just about the beauty of the photo. Instead, I believe it was about the symbolism. Somehow, against the odds, nature survived. It thrived in tough surroundings. That speaks to our human condition. We appreciate the underdog; we love to see the little guy going up against the giants and winning. And we also want to see the splendor of nature make it in our increasingly man-made and technological environment.
This past week, our area of North Texas got hit with seven inches of rain over a three-day period after almost four straight months (close to five, actually) of nearly not a drop of precipitation. During that time, the two tomato plants and one banana pepper plant I had in our garden died. I watered for awhile, trying to keep them alive in the blistering, brain-fatiguing heat and sun, but they browned up and keeled over.
A second banana pepper plant stayed alive for some reason. Even more strange, I chose not to yank it out and toss it into our compost pile. Instead, because it wilted, but didn’t fully expire, I left it in the soil. The leaves still maintained some greenery. They drooped. The stem tilted and wilted. But it hung on.
Then the deluge hit, and like magic, the plant righted itself, greened up, and grew. I remarked on this to my wife – how close I’d been to yanking it out, and how remarkable it was that the plant could get beat up day after day by the heat and sun and cling to life, then suddenly be uplifted by three-day downpours.
Many years ago, I had the opportunity to visit Australia, and head to the outback, where Ayers Rock sits. It’s a huge sandstone in the middle of desert-like conditions, with nothing around except scrub for as far as you can see. Millions of years ago, that part of the country was under the ocean. Today it gets (if my fuzzy memory serves me adequately) about two week’s worth of rain during a short period of time.
As I climbed the rock, there were tiny indentations in the rock, perhaps big enough for you to insert the tip of your thumb. Inside there was water. In that water, I saw tadpole-like creatures swimming.
This made me wonder what type of amphibian could survive without rain for 50 weeks out of the year, go into hibernation, then reproduce in two weeks when it did rain. Nature won. It survived.
The solitary tree, banana pepper and tiny tadpole all defy the odds and demonstrate how nature restores itself. As we batter away against the natural world with high technology, tools and weapons, it remains a wonder to see nature making a statement, telling us, “I can stand up against all odds.”