Photograph Works

Look at that tiny figure, Look at the big trees, so spectacular. The tree in the foreground is a ginkgo biloba. Behind that is a Caucasian Wingnut, and to the side is a Horse Chestnut.

Hadrian’s Wall

For 300 years during the Roman occupation of Britain, Hadrian’s Wall was the north-west frontier of the Roman empire. The wall was built by the Roman army on the orders of the emperor Hadrian who visited Britain in AD 122.

Can you imagine being an emperor and saying ‘build a wall across Britain to keep out the marauding Picts and Scots’.

The Sycamore Gap Tree

To get back to trees and their splendour, the downside is that a tree cannot run away when someone comes along with a chainsaw, as happened with the Sycamore Gap tree – a tree growing more or less on Hadrian’s Wall.

The photo below of the Sycamore Gap tree is not mine. It is from Wikimedia Commons and the photographer Johnnie Shannon has released it under a ‘free to use and share’ licence CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

This is the tree that was but is no more. It was chopped down on 28 September, 2023

When the news broke that the Sycamore Gap tree had been chopped down there was outrage and sadness across Britain..

And now:

Two men have been charged with cutting down the famous Sycamore Gap tree in Northumberland. Daniel Graham, 38, and Adam Carruthers, 31, will appear in court on 15 May, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said.
Northumbria Police said they have been charged with causing criminal damage to the tree and to Hadrian’s Wall.

They are men in their thirties, not kids. What possessed them to chop the tree down? Were they riding about with a chainsaw in the back of the van with the chainsaw calling out to them – Use me, use me? Did they know what tree it was? Were they actively looking for the tree?

The Gunnera is off to an early start, I thought. At least that is what I was thinking until I realised it is already May. Spring sprang a few days ago but before that it was cold for ages. So I kind of thought we were earlier in the year than we are..

Other things tell me that the year is moving on. Many flowers have flowered and gone, But I have been out of touch with the sense of the seasons I have been. Can I put it down to world events discombobulating the senses? The trip to Japan? The daily life of being married to a blindingly bright woman.

Other things that have filled in the space? I am reading Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar. I have known about it for years of course, but never read it. And I started Hesse’s Steppenwolf, which I read a decades ago and realised I have been carrying a thought or an idea and it’s a good time to go back and look at it. And my buddies, they occupy my thoughts as well.