The Bent Trees

I see them everywhere, although two stand out with peculiar regularity. Bent Trees. Shrubbery that for some reason has been dented, shifted, bent to either wind or car or manmade object. There's the 10 year-old Crabapple tree on Route 3, just before the southbound Rutherford exit. 5 years ago it was a mere sapling trying to branch out in a pollution riddled highway. One day I drove by noticing that the lovely darling had been almost completely knocked over. Tiremarks burned into the soil bore evidence of the culprit. An car. From the looks of it driving far too fast to make the 30 mph curve. So instead it smashed into the tree using the youthful shrub as a blockade. I feared the tree would die but miraculously it didn't. It leaned almost 45 degrees to the east but its roots must have still maintained contact with the earth. In late spring it bloomed into light pink blossoms. In summer it sported luxuriant leaves. Fall they changed to a glorious burgundy. Although it never did bear fruit, probably due to the fact that an appropriate boy or girl tree was not within easy pollinating distance.

Then there's Cypress, a mere shrub really that I see on my morning commute on the NJ Lightrail. In front of Pavonia Mall the cypress, along with a half dozen more span the entrance to the parking garage. At some point the wrought iron railing between the garage and the shrubs fell over, its entire weight resting on one cypress in particular. The first day I saw it I wanted to leap up, rush off the train and hoist off the offending rail. But I didn't. Proof that good intentions and kind hearts are not enough. As time passed I watched the cypress with sadness, until one day the railing had been righted. The shrub still tilted inwardly like a broken finger unable to mend. It's rust color indicative that it is now an ex-cypress, a dead cypress. A sad reminder of the bent tree syndrome.