A little late night reading

The Giving Tree
by Shel Silverstein

    Once there was a tree..... and she loved a little boy.  And every day the boy would come and he would gather her leaves and make them into crowns and play king of the forest.  He would climb up her trunk and swing from her branches and eat apples. And they would play hide-and-go-seek.  And when he was tired, he would sleep in her shade. And the boy loved the tree.......very much.  And the tree was happy.

    But time went by.  And the boy grew older.  And the tree was often alone.  Then one day the boy came to the tree and the tree said, "Come, Boy, come and climb up my trunk and swing from my branches and eat apples and play in my shade and be happy."

    "I am too big to climb and play," said the boy.  "I want to buy things and have fun.  I want some money.  Can you give me some money?"
    "I'm sorry," said the tree, "but I have no money, I have only leaves and apples.  Take my apples, Boy, and sell them in the city. Then you will have money and you will be happy." And so the boy climbed up the tree and gathered her apples and carried them away.  And the tree was happy.

    But the boy stayed away for a long time... and the tree was sad.  And then one day the boy came back and the tree shook with joy and she said, "Come, Boy, climb up my trunk and swing from my branches and be happy."

    "I am too busy to climb trees," said the boy. "I want a house to keep me warm.  I want a wife and I want children, and so I need a house.  Can you give me a house?"

    "I have no house," said the tree. "The forest is my house, but you may cut off my branches and build a house.  Then you will be happy." And the boy cut off her branches and carried them away to build his house.  And the tree was happy.

    But the boy stayed away for a long time. And when he came back, the tree was so happy she could hardly speak. "Come, Boy," she whispered, "Come and play."

    “I am too old and sad to play," said the boy. "I want a boat that can take me far away from here. Can you give me a boat?"

    "Cut down my trunk and make a boat," said the tree. "Then you can sail away...... and be happy." And so the boy cut down her trunk and made a boat and sailed away.  And the tree was happy.... but not really.  And after a long time the boy came back again.

    "I am sorry, Boy," said the tree, "but I have nothing left to give you.  My apples are gone."

    "My teeth are too weak for apples," said the boy.

    "My branches are gone," said the tree. "You cannot swing on them.”

    "I am too old to swing on branches," said the boy.

    "My trunk is gone," said the tree. "You cannot climb."

    "I am too tired to climb," said the boy.

    "I am sorry," sighed the tree. "I wish that I could give you something------ but I have nothing left. I am just an old stump."

   "I don't need very much now," said the boy. "just a quiet place to sit and rest. I am very tired."

   "Well," said the tree, straightening herself up as much as she could, "Well, an old stump is good for sitting and resting. Come, Boy, sit down. Sit down and rest." And the boy did.  And the tree was happy.

 

Another soggy Sunday

We have been having some serious rain here in Salem the past few weeks.  So much so in fact that many of the smaller streams and rivers around town have flood warnings in place.  I have driven past a few homes and business this week that are all sand bagged and ready to go!  I checked the creek behind our house and noticed it has overflowed its banks already! Luckily our house is high enough above the water level I think it would be next to impossible for the creek to flood enough to reach us.

With all the rain and high water, I was really looking forward to my water sampling this morning! Once I month I go out to a boat launch on the Willamette to take some water quality tests for the Willamette Riverkeepers, a non-profit who reports their data to the Oregon DEQ. If ever there was a great volunteer position, this is definitely the one! Spending a morning out on the quiet river watching eagles fly past is definitely a peaceful way to start the day (of course then I get to come home to a full on knights vs viking battle waging in my living room! haha)

When I got out to the river this morning the water level was very high.  There were five or six large trees that were whisked past as I ran my tests and there was so much sediment in the water I couldn't see more than three inches down!  It took me about an hour and a half to run two sets of tests on conductivity, water temperature, turbidity and dissolved oxygen content. Needless to say I was pretty well soaked by the time I was done!

Just a little wet

part of my test kit

No turning back now!

All my life I have felt young, and I have yearned to be older, wiser, more experienced, more mature, highly regarded.  I assume we all have felt that way from time to time.  I remember in grade school I would watch the older kids sitting in the back of the bus.  The girls with their pierced ears, their cooler backpacks.  By the time I was old enough to ride in the back of the bus though (which I actually never did by the way lol)  I was dreaming about bigger and better things.  I couldn't wait to move on to jr high school with lockers and make up and (hopefully) boys :) I still felt too young, like too much of a baby to get the things I really wanted.  When jr high days came, I was looking onward to high school.  Thinking about cars, part time jobs, real boyfriends, college applications, the future.  And as you might imagine, high school years were filled with dreams about the freedoms of college, the thrill of higher education, the excitement of striking out on my own.  It seemed no matter what I did, no matter how many years went by, I was still just too frustratingly young!  I felt young on my wedding day (and I suppose at 21, I was)  and I was sure there were probably a few well meaning guests in the crowd silently shaking their heads at my youthful fool-hardiness.  I felt too young when my son was born.  Like I wouldn't be taken seriously as a mother because I still had a baby face myself.  Every time a stranger responded with surprise when I told them "actually this is my son"  I felt the desire to speed up time, to go shop for a new wardrobe, to re-evaluate the way I wore my hair.  Instead of "Ten Years Younger"  I was on the hunt for "Ten Years Older."

I'm not sure when it happened, but somewhere along the line I stopped caring.  At some point I settled into myself and I no longer spent time worrying about looking or feeling too young.  Perhaps with the births of my second and third sons, I just became too busy to notice such things.  Who knows. For the past few years, I have even had a hard time remembering my exact age, it just seems to not matter anymore.  Recently however, I have started to be aware of my age in a new way.  I am now closer to 30 than I am to 20.  All of a sudden some of the excuses I have been telling myself for years are getting harder to believe.  I am having a hard time convincing myself that I don't need to worry about daily moisturizers and night creams and eye creams and face scrubs.  I'm having a hard time believing that I don't need to stress if I don't put money into my IRA every month. It's difficult to tell myself it's alright if I'm slacking on my house keeping because I'm a "young mom" after all!  Even more difficult to tell myself I don't need to join a gym yet, because I am still young and can eat whatever I want.

So here's to a new year and the second half of my 20's.  Here's to a new gym membership, skin products, savings plans, housekeeping routines and even self imposed bedtimes. And here's to no longer feeling too young ;-)