The Comeback

Amber Ellis

Last year in the fall there was a large tree growing next to the road. It was leaning slightly to one side with beautiful red and yellow leaves covering its branches. I took a picture of it for my photography class because of its smooth ivory bark. It embodied silent grace and was unlike any of the other trees on that street. It was the elegance of fall.

For several months after and all through the summer I had no reason to walk down that street on which this tree stood. In fact I’d forgotten all about it until one day, unexpectedly, I passed by and it was gone!

For whatever reason some ambitious human being had chopped it down, split it up and spirited away the pieces. They probably had assumed, even in all its glory, that they could just grow another one. “Yeah 60, 70 years from now, you wont even miss this old thing.”

This tree was beautiful and extremely unique. Uniqueness equals value, in my thinking. If you have something that’s unlike anything else you can ever get again, chances are you’ll want to keep it (I’m sure I’m leaving out several possible scenarios in this conclusion. Example: what if you didn’t want said prize in the first place.) or you’ll have a really good reason to get rid of it. Trees don’t just come a dime a dozen. You can’t plant and grow a forest in the next five years. Especially if you’re not making paper from its pieces, I’d think you’d would want to keep the trees that are around. (But then again I’m sentimental about things like trees and words and useless little gifts that do no one any good.)

This all sounds very much like Dr. Suess’ Lorax and maybe its just a tree, but my point is there are things that can’t be reversed or gathered back together or recreated. This is life and it keeps on going.

So what are you going to do? The tree is gone, vanished into thin air along with its leaves and any birds nests that may have been timidly constructed in its branches. You could sit on the stump if you like, pondering the finality of all things. Or you could wait for the comeback.

“There will be a time when you believe everything is finished. That will be the beginning.” -Louis L’Amour

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