This Year’s Arbor Day Had a Personal Meaning

My family has had a rule for some time that if we lose a tree (or have to cut one down for some reason) that we need to figure out how to plant two to replace it. It’s a rule that’s hard to follow sometimes, especially when a storm comes through and takes out two of the tallest trees on our heavily-forested cliffside property here in Georgia.
But luckily Arbory Digital is willing to pitch in and help on Arbor Day, so I had company backing in the enterprise of planting some new trees to try to pay our “arbor debt.”

A thing I should mention is that, as a parent of 3, my wife and I have tried to engender in our kids a really personal relationship with the woods. Responsibility depends in a great degree on personal contact and understanding, and we have zero hope for the future of our environment if we don’t raise kids who love trees.

So, the kids came with us and picked out a pair of trees which we then planted on the edges of our forest.

We planted a gorgeous flowering apple tree at the front of our house, and a pink flowering dogwood at the back near the mountain bike trails that my son has made.

So, we recently lost our family dog of 13 years - an American Foxhound named Lady. She grew up in a laboratory, and was rescued by my sister-in-law, a DC-area Vet. Uncomfortable in being on city streets around lumbering vehicles, she was immediately at home on the trails of the woods by our house and was a big part of our constant trail hikes with the kids as they grew up.

As such, given the fact that it’s a family tradition for us to name every tree we plant, the kids immediately and unanimously decided to name the pink dogwood “Lady Dogwood” in her honor, as she’d of course always want to be in the woods on our trails.

Going through the motions to plant a tree may seem small an insignificant in the grand scheme of things. It definitely seems insignificant in the scope of an already-sizable forest.

But Mr. Julius Sterling Morton - the man who is largely responsible for the Arbor Day movement in the United States - once said:

It’s that spirit that we’re not just carrying on ourselves, but hoping to imbue into our children as well - and that’s most certainly not insignificant.

We’re happy to carry on that tradition, and hopefully can convince a few more people to do the same.

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