The windy evenings along with rains are common in the pre-monsoon period in our area. The casualty yesterday was the breaking away of one branch of a Rambutan tree in our front garden.
The tree had many fruits and were in the ripening stage.
A careful examination of the reason for the weakening of the branch helped me to suspect that the plastic cable tied around it restrained the growth of the stem. The plastic cable was for birds to rest before and after feeding from the feeding station.
The plastic cable restrained the growth of the stem circumferentially weakening it to bear the weight of the foliage and fruits. With a strong wind blowing and swaying the branch and foliage, the branch succumbed at its vulnerable site!
I realise that the cable had gone deeper inside the bark thereby chronically stressing the branch from growing !
I feel sorry that we did not keep a watch over the effect of such an act of tying a cable around the branch rather tightly! The copper wire inside the cable was solid and not elastic. An ordinary plastic wire or nylon or cotton thread would not have had a similar impact.
I took time to reflect on this after seeing this site in the garden!
The tree remained vulnerable at a braking point for weeks. It was not noticed.
That is how some people crumble emotionally and behaviourally when faced with long standing stress, not well attended to. As I grow older, I realise there are more vulnerable situations because of the process of ageing, affecting me physically, behaviourally and cognitively.
A self audit is therefore a desirable practice as a protective and preventive step to remain safer ! The trigger events are too many to tilt the delicately balanced comfort level!
Living well while growing older is a worthwhile focus of attention. I picked up a book from our book shelf at home yesterday, written in 1985 by Dr Paul Turner, a Swiz medical practitioner, Learning to Grow Old. At 72 years while he wrote this book while he was reflecting on several stories of older people loosing their wellness emotionally and socially. He referred to two turning points in life- becoming a youth and later an older person. The elderly have to grow up well, coping with the losses that would occur gradually. And yet it is also a time of celebration of life and grateful recollection of experiences in the family, at work place and social ambience.
I felt enthused by the aspirational view that Dr Tournier had for himself at 72 years of age.
The branch of the tree was full of fruits. It is broken, but it leaves behind fruits !
That is the call for fruitfulness, when one learns to grow older!
M.C.Mathew (text and photo)
No comments:
Post a Comment