A Feeling Of Sadness

For many years, the rural hamlet of Ghent, Columbia County, New York, had an iconic house. It was on the main street, State Route 66. It was quirky, and it was an eccentric landmark. It was a small house with a porch. What made it so unusual was that an enormous tree grew through the porch. Looking at the house made it clear: the tree came first, far more than a century ago, and the porch, a later, flimsier, manmade object, respected the importance of the tree and yielded to it.

Many people saw and marveled at the house and its porch. More than once when I mentioned Ghent, someone responded, “Is that where the house has a tree through the roof?” Here’s a photo of the house from 2011:

Yesterday when I drove down Route 66 I had an enormous surprise. A real shock that led slowly to despair. Not only was the porch gone, yes, it really was completely removed, but also the tree’s limbs had been removed and the entire tree was coming down as well. Today I found the remains of the tree lying in the yard. Here’s a photo of the house today:

I’m sure there are many seeming reasons for this. The house, after all was for sale last year, and who knows what kind of engineering havoc the tree’s roots did to the foundation and the plumbing. This is private property. It’s not a building preserved by statute or ordinance. But all of that seems oddly beside the point.

This is sad. I don’t want to be overly dramatic about it. But it’s as if a familiar neighbor, an acquaintance who lived nearby has died. I know nothing about why it happened, and I know that things like this happen often, but I feel the loss deeply.

I know the famous gatha well:

“From interdependent causes all things arise, and all things fade away, so teaches the Perfectly Enlightened One.”

I get it. I'm sure you do too. This is only another example of impermanence. It’s only natural that the house would eventually fall down, and that the tree would eventually topple or have to be cut down. And that eventually they’d both be gone. And their odd symbiotic relationship would be ended. Nothing is permanent, everything changes, everything fades away. This includes the iconic Ghent house and it’s giant maple tree, too.

Today, in their place is a pervasive feeling of sadness, which, too, I am sure, will eventually fade away.

Oxidation

This old dump truck has been sitting in the woods near my home for a long time. I first saw it about 26 years ago. Back then, I assumed its owner would pick it up and drive it away. Or haul it away if it wouldn’t run and repair it. It was worth something, I thought. But that hasn’t happened. It remains in the very same spot. Unmoved. In repose. Slowly rusting and rotting and deteriorating. Its registration expired in 1980.

When all of us are long gone, this truck may still be sitting in the woods waiting for the archeologists or historians to find it. They will make up elaborate stories about why it’s still there. And how it got there. But the race between oxidation and storytelling, between destruction and preservation is already underway. How long will it be before this truck is wearing a rich, brown coat of flaky rust, and its once shiny red color is just a conjecture? And how long will it be before its tires have disappeared leaving it sitting on its muddy axels? And how long will it be before its interior – its windows have been open for decades – is a smelly pile of rotting debris slowly corroding its already rotting floorboards from the top?

Impermanence, we are taught is a fact. A Gatha: "From interdependent causes, all things arise and fade away, so teaches the perfectly enlightened one." In my mind, it all happens relatively quickly. Lives are too short. Relationships are too short. Things that we love are all too quick to fade and break and end. But this truck reminds me that it also happens slowly. Sometimes excruciatingly slowly. Plastic takes 10,000 years to break down in sea water. How long will it take to reduce this dump truck to its lowest common denominator, to unrecognizable particles?