An early environmental memory
I stand on the bright green carpet of my grandmother’s garden. Heavily scented flowers permeate the air, blooming bright around me. Trees tower over me, I am surrounded by lush foliage and deep emerald. I know the pool is behind the edge of the thick, over where the trees leave a hollow space in their canopy. I know there is shade there, and cool water, and endless fun.
I look up, always, to that gap in the trees. It is how I find my way through the garden. It is not a blank space but bright blue, the colour of deep summer. It holds a speck of white, floating through the air. A deep, rumbling sound follows, a short delay keeping pace with the one cloudy stripe marring the summer blue. The sound rumbles through my body, rattles my bones. It is the first time I remember hearing a plane fly by. I think I recognise orange wings on the white speck, the plane racing out of my blue windowpane. I think to myself, it doesn’t belong there. Yet it does. It is still a sound I deeply associate with summer, even in the dead of winter when the world is frozen solid and the sky holds a different hint of blue.
I think of this place today and realise it is not just my first encounter with a deeply recognisable urban sound heard from miles away. More importantly, it is one of my earliest memories of trees offering a protective, restorative environment amidst that same urban chaos. Although I have not seen the trees from this memory in years, and I doubt they still exist in that densely forested garden, I still look up whenever I walk under a tree. I take pictures of the canopy now, comparing the different tree canopy shapes for their tree architectural qualities and their effectiveness in cooling their urban environment. I wonder how other people feel about those same trees, if the trees instil in them the same sense of calm, of restoration and belonging.•
Inspired by Rebecca Giggs
Holland coast line, acrylic on paper, 150x100 mm, September 2021